F-ckin Leap Seconds, how do they work?

Tue Jul 3 20:09:53 UTC 2012

On (2012-07-03 12:46 -0700), Owen DeLong wrote:

> If you don't know that time is not monotonically increasing, then that only becomes a software bug when you codify your own ignorance into software you write.

If only all software could be ordered from you Owen, but in practice this
is not possible. Some code will be written less intelligent people. And
reviewing any code doing foo = timestamp+offset and if now > foo, virtually
never expects time to move backwards.

UTC doesn't move backwards (it goes 59 -> 60 -> 00). TAI does not move
backwards. Unixtime moves backwards, like spanish inquisition no one
expects that.

> It is well known that leap seconds exist.

Quite. But it is not well known that unixtime travels backwards.

-- 
  ++ytti