[LEAPSECS] RE : nails in the coffin of mean solar time

[Zefram]

Delporte Jerome wrote:

>So I don't understand this assertion that replacing leap seconds by

>leap hours would break any link to mean solar time ...


The leap hour plan is so impractical that no one here thinks one would
actually ever be executed.  Adopting the leap hour proposal would just
postpone leaps for the next 600 years or so, during which time it is
presumed our descendants would scrap leaps altogether.  We therefore
judge the leap hour proposal as a dishonest version of the proposal to
abolish leaps at once (hence the "shell game" comment from Rob).

The enormous problems in executing leap hours have been dissected on
this list in the past; see the archive.  To summarise: leap hour events
would be so infrequent that software would never be properly tested
(or even written) to deal with them; local gross violation of the
1440-minute day model; notational difficulty in referring to points in
the leap hour when using timezones; difficulty achieving international
agreement on scheduling; difficulty finding political will to institute
such a disruptive event.  In all these respects, and others, the leap
hour plan is totally unlike the existing UTC with leap seconds (and
earlier UTC with sub-second leaps).

-zefram