[LEAPSECS] BBC radio Crowd Science

[John Sauter]

On Sat, 2017-01-28 at 20:56 +0000, Michael.Deckers. via LEAPSECS wrote:
> 
>     On 2017-01-28 17:33, Steve Allen wrote:
> > BBC radio Crowd Science took a listener question about
> > What is the Real Time?
> > and produced a half hour tour that included three atomic Time Lords
> > Whibberley, Matsakis, and Arias.
> > http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04q778b
> > and concluded pretty much saying that we have a choice.
> 
>     Thanks for that link!
> 
>     I find it remarkable that Arias in effect stated
>     that the discontinuities of the difference TAI - UTC
>     happen at the beginning of leap seconds, so that
>     positive leap seconds are labeled as the second
>     59th seconds of a minute. Neither the ITU definition
>     of UTC nor the IERS bulletins about leap seconds
>     specify that detail, unfortunately.

She prefers to label the leap second as a second 23:59:59, but the UTC
definition calls it 23:59:60.

>     She is also stated to call leap seconds a
>     "dangerous thing" -- as soon as this is
>     substantiated (such as by a loss of health
>     connected with a computer misinterpretation
>     of leap seconds) it will be a powerful argument
>     for their abolition.
> 
>     Michael Deckers.

I would not blame leap seconds but the programmer who did not properly
test for leap seconds when developing his software.  Leap seconds have
been around for over 30 years, so it isn't like they are a new
requirement.
    John Sauter (John_Sauter at systemeyescomputerstore.com)