[time-nuts] Re: UTC - A Cautionary Tale

Bill Hawkins bill at iaxs.net
Sat Jul 16 22:51:03 EDT 2005


M. Warner Losh said, 
"Time sources are in UTC, and you need a leapsecond
count to recover TAI."

Is this what all the fuss is about? UTC is all that is distributed
and you have to do a subtraction to get TAI?

He also said, on the subject of NTP and one days notice,
"So while the computers are likely to get it right on the day of the
event, if you've not made plans to ensure that other parts of your
operation are covered, you'd be in for a surprise."

This is the part that I don't get. What kind of civil time user is
going to be upset by the addition of a second?

He ends with,
"This stuff is hard to get right, even for experts like Dave Mills."

So if it needs to be done and it's hard to do, we should quit and go
have a beer, right?

Maybe you listen to music when you write code?  :-)

Regards,
Bill Hawkins





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