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No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

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Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#161

Post by ncallaway »

dcminter wrote: post #133
charonn0 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Count Binface I did not expect this to be a real person. Is he with the Standing At The Back Dressed Stupidly And Looking Stupid party?

Hilariously, no. That would be the Monster Raving Loony party who will apparently also be standing in this by-election. Count Binface has ruled out a pact with them.

I was very disappointed to hear that the Monster Raving Loony party is deciding to stand and split the vote.

I thought this was an opportunity for them to be tactical, but no.

(this is a joke)

Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#164

Post by charlieyu1 »

tialaramex wrote: post #70
_alternator_ wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In short, yes, the weather, geology, and signicantly, human movement of water via aquifer draining and dam building, as well as glaicial and ice melts, all contribute to unpredictable changes in the earths rotational period, as well as the axis of rotation. The models for this are IIRC trigonometric polynomials of fairly low order, so even if we could model the unpredictability perfectly, truncation error would limit…

2035 is the agreed drop dead date. Everybody agreed that "Leap seconds" are a sufficiently bad idea that they should be replaced by 2035. Nobody has agreed how to fix it, and "Just turn them off" isn't technically legal. However, "What if there were Leap hours instead?" is technically legal and of course those hours would happen in the very distant future (likely after our civilisation is gone) so it's functionally i…

Leap minutes. You only change your clock when you have accumulated a minute of error. Then you only need to change it once per century

Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#165

Post by eqvinox »

aidenn0 wrote: post #138
eqvinox wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UNIX timestamps are fully ignorant of leap seconds, i.e. pretends they don't exist. That means there can be physical seconds of time that cannot be referenced with a UNIX timestamp (when a leap second is inserted) as well as UNIX timestamps for seconds that don't exist (when a leap second is deleted).

It also means that if you subtract two timestamps, you might not get the actual time between them. Though this is also true of most ways of representing time (TAI being a notable exception).

The really annoying part is that "leap smearing" (where people decided to just mush the leap second across about day) has made CLOCK_MONOTONIC unclear in this regard, since some leap smearing approaches affect that as well. Which destroyed any assumption a developer could make about CLOCK_MONOTONIC, since you won't know if leap smearing is in use :(.

(And depending on the leap smearing implementation, it also smears CLOCK_TAI, jumps it to opposite polarity at the actual time of leap second, and then smears it again. The leap smearing people really made a mess of this.)

From a correctness perspective, the only good choice is to go all-in on TAI.

[Ed./P.S.:] "just ignore leap seconds" - that's going all-in on TAI. At this point it's probably easier to redefine UNIX timestamps as TAI based after 2035 ("abolishing leap seconds"), and introduce a new CLOCK_SOLAR_EARTH that accumulates leap seconds and can be used if/where necessary. The main issue is to create a proper delineation between the two clocks, which we just don't have at this point. Way too many systems where it's just not clear what they use.

And note that leap seconds are earth specific too. You'll have entirely different requirements on e.g. Mars.

Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#166

Post by markdown »

tialaramex wrote: post #70
_alternator_ wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In short, yes, the weather, geology, and signicantly, human movement of water via aquifer draining and dam building, as well as glaicial and ice melts, all contribute to unpredictable changes in the earths rotational period, as well as the axis of rotation. The models for this are IIRC trigonometric polynomials of fairly low order, so even if we could model the unpredictability perfectly, truncation error would limit…

2035 is the agreed drop dead date. Everybody agreed that "Leap seconds" are a sufficiently bad idea that they should be replaced by 2035. Nobody has agreed how to fix it, and "Just turn them off" isn't technically legal. However, "What if there were Leap hours instead?" is technically legal and of course those hours would happen in the very distant future (likely after our civilisation is gone) so it's functionally i…

> Now, I'm English, and England loves this sort of hack

The 999 year lease to essentially make land practically freehold is one.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/999-year_lease

It's caused significant controversy in my (former colony) country where all other long-term leases are 99 years. The landowners are insisting that their ancestors were cheated and they want their land back.

Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#167

Post by jvanderbot »

_alternator_ wrote: post #50
doctoboggan wrote: post #30

What causes the unpredictability in this? I would have guessed we have earth's rotation and orbit down to many decimals. Does geological activity, weather, or something else cause rotation speed differences that we just can't predict?

In short, yes, the weather, geology, and signicantly, human movement of water via aquifer draining and dam building, as well as glaicial and ice melts, all contribute to unpredictable changes in the earths rotational period, as well as the axis of rotation. The models for this are IIRC trigonometric polynomials of fairly low order, so even if we could model the unpredictability perfectly, truncation error would limit…

I prefer ephemeris time

Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#168

Post by defrost »

tialaramex wrote: post #153
dmurray wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite a few MPs in Westminster already don't take their physical seats in Parliament (and never vote or address the House) because the conditions attached to doing so aren't compatible with their principles. Maybe Count Binface will be the next.

It's understood by constituents that a vote for a Sinn Féin representative is a protest vote that results in specifically nobody going to Westminster to represent you. I cannot imagine that any significant number of people vote for them and are then astonished when this has the effect everybody else expects. On the other hand, Binface has not, as I understand it, ever said he would not serve if elected. He's made it…

Either way, it's a contest already bringing out the sporting punters and popcorn eaters of Australia: Joke Candidate To Face Count Binface in UK By-Election

- https://theshovel.com.au/2026/07/09/joke-candidate-to-face-c...

Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#169

Post by [deleted] »

overboard2 wrote: post #113
tialaramex wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Vote Count Binface and Bin the Cunt" :D There's a long tradition in the UK of having electoral candidates who don't expect to win but run because it's free publicity in a high profile race. "Count Binface" is a comedian who dresses up as a space alien whose outfit resembles well, having a Bin for a face. The serious political parties told Nigel to fuck off, if he wants to step down and then immediately contest the s…

Nigel Farage has decided to counter a scandal by throwing himself upon his constituents for judgement, the obviously establishment parties have backed off to allow Binface to run against him in a ~1v1, and you think Binface is more anti establishment than Farage?

[deleted]

Re: No leap second will be introduced at the end of December 2026

#170

Post by mtoner23 »

eqvinox wrote: post #165
aidenn0 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also means that if you subtract two timestamps, you might not get the actual time between them. Though this is also true of most ways of representing time (TAI being a notable exception).

The really annoying part is that "leap smearing" (where people decided to just mush the leap second across about day) has made CLOCK_MONOTONIC unclear in this regard, since some leap smearing approaches affect that as well. Which destroyed any assumption a developer could make about CLOCK_MONOTONIC, since you won't know if leap smearing is in use :(. (And depending on the leap smearing implementation, it also smears…

After reading all that, maybe we should just have some bugs in our code and stop making up new things
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