We abandond the sun?  You did that when you changed from Solar Time to
Time zones.  And again with Daylight Savings Time..  And I looked up
the change in time on Wikipedia, and calculated a year gets 1 second
longer every 150 years or so, so in 2200 we would have a leap second
every year, in 2350 we would have a leap second twice a year, etc.

P.S.  Ever compare time between an Android Phone and an iPhone?  The
network time is based on the Unix standard of seconds since
1970-01-01, ignoring subsequent seconds.  iPhones are coded to add the
leap seconds before displaying the time, Androids are not.

On Thu, Apr 9, 2020 at 9:33 PM Bob Bridges <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> I just read an article about time-keeping that made a claim that puzzles me:
>
> "But most people — including commercial programmers, who write the critical 
> software that controls public and private infrastructure — don’t know about 
> the leap second, Matsakis said, and that means their code doesn’t account for 
> it. So when a new leap second rolls around, things break. Reddit, LinkedIn, 
> and Yelp all suffered issues related to the last leap second in 2012. And, 
> more seriously, computer booking systems used by Qantas Airlines all 
> struggled, delaying flights by hours.
>
> "In some cases, it is impossible to update systems before the next leap 
> second arrives. Matsakis spoke of a Switzerland power company whose backup 
> systems only turn on when needed—otherwise, they sit disconnected from the 
> network. When they were activated in a test after the last leap second, they 
> crashed."
>
> What's this about?  What would crash because we didn't account for a leap 
> second?  Why wouldn't a plane scheduled to leave at 13:44:20 on a certain day 
> simply leave at 13:44:19 instead?
>
> The article is here:
> https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/01/the-over-perfection-of-humans-global-clock/384355/
>
> ---
> Bob Bridges, [email protected], cell 336 382-7313
>
> /* Getting an inch of snow is like winning 10 cents in the lottery.  -from 
> _Calvin & Hobbes_ */
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions,
> send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN



-- 
Mike A Schwab, Springfield IL USA
Where do Forest Rangers go to get away from it all?

----------------------------------------------------------------------
For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions,
send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN

Reply via email to