F-ckin Leap Seconds, how do they work?

Steve Allen sla at ucolick.org
Wed Jul 4 15:58:11 UTC 2012


On 2012 Jul 4, at 08:50, Jimmy Hess wrote:
> So accept the inaccuracy and correct the clock  in the normal way that
> NTP corrects clocks that have drifted.

This is basically the "leap smear" that google instituted after
the issues in 2005.  It works nicely in cloud applications where
real-time is not an issue.  It does not work so well when precision
calculations of real-time physics are important, nor in heterogeneous
environments where not all devices pay attention to NTP or some
handle the leap differently than others.  Those are places
where a kernel should never be asked to do what the combination
of POSIX and leap seconds demand.
                                                                                
--
Steve Allen               <sla at ucolick.org>              WGS-84 (GPS)
UCO/Lick Observatory      Natural Sciences II, Room 165  Lat  +36.99855
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