Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 15:31:53 -0800 From: "Kevin Oberman" <oberman@es.net> To: Peter Jeremy <PeterJeremy@optushome.com.au> Cc: Poul-Henning Kamp <phk@phk.freebsd.dk>, current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: FreeBSD handles leapsecond correctly Message-ID: <20060102233153.7D1345D07@ptavv.es.net> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 03 Jan 2006 10:22:08 %2B1100." <20060102232208.GC42228@cirb503493.alcatel.com.au>
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> Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 10:22:08 +1100 > From: Peter Jeremy <PeterJeremy@optushome.com.au> > Sender: owner-freebsd-current@freebsd.org > > On Mon, 2006-Jan-02 23:27:31 +0100, Poul-Henning Kamp wrote: > >Interestingly, the main reason why calendar reform is a no-talk > >issue seems to be that The Vatican owns the standardization area > >of calendars because they have written all (relevant) standards for > >the area in the past. > > Actually, the Vatican has only been responsible for one variant of the > Western calendar (the Gregorian). The Julian calendar predates the > Christian church. The Vatican was open to calendar reform at the time > because trying to combine elements of both Lunar and Solar calendars > with a relatively inaccurate year length meant that Easter was heading > for Christmas - which was felt to be undesirable. The actual > algorithm was not developed within the Vatican but was promulgated by > the Vatican because it was about the only international body which > more than one or two countries would actually take any notice of - and > even so, it wasn't until the 20th Century that (eg) Russia switched. > > Islam has its own calendar (with a particularly painful Leap Year > calculation that gives very marginally more accuracy than the > Gregorian). I'm not sure how the Chinese, Hindu, Japanese and Jewish > calendars handle leap years. (I think that covers the major non- > Gregorian calendars). > > >According to one insider, none of the possible owners of a new > >calendar (ITU, ISO & BIPM) can bring it on themselves to ask the > >pope permission to take over the area. > > The Gregorian algorithm is reasonably accurate - I think it's good for > about 1 day in 3000 years. I don't know how this compares to the > magnitude of miscellaneous perturbations in the Earth's orbit but it's > likely to be a couple of thousand years before a further adjustmens is > necessary. > > The obvious solution is to shift the Earth's orbit slightly towards > the Sun to provide an even 365 day period. To make things even > simpler, move the Earth a bit further to give a 360 day period and > move the moon a bit further away to give a 30 day period. (Of course > the downside of the latter change is that solar eclipses would become > even rarer and might even disappear totally). With a bit of tweaking > of the Earth's rotation, the need for leap seconds can also be removed. We keep trying to define the universe and keep getting annoyed when the universe fails to cooperate. I still want pi to be 3.14. Yeah, it would warp the universe rather badly, but would make the arithmetic so much easier. And I guess sin(90) would no longer be rational, either. Guess we just can't win. :-( I like the old "joke": Q. How do you make God laugh? A. Tell him your plans. -- R. Kevin Oberman, Network Engineer Energy Sciences Network (ESnet) Ernest O. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) E-mail: oberman@es.net Phone: +1 510 486-8634
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