[LEAPSECS] it's WP7A week in Geneva

[Rob Seaman]

M. Warner Losh wrote:


> Rob Seaman <seaman at noao.edu> writes:

>

>> First, discover the requirements.  Second, figure out how to meet  

>> them.

>

> While the requirements are "known" up front, the problems in meeting  

> them are much more non-trivial than people like Rob have said they  

> should be.


As Gertrude Stein said, "a requirement is a requirement is a  
requirement".  Either UTC is required to remain tied to the sun or it  
isn't.  How much effort is necessary to make this work is separate  
from the question of whether the requirement must be met.

I have (tediously, bombastically, endlessly) asserted that civil time  
IS solar time.  This is a statement of requirements.  Requirements  
describe the problem space.

On the other hand, focusing on leap second issues - whether features  
or bugs - is to grapple with solution space.  One can certainly  
entertain trading off one solution in favor of another.  One cannot,  
however, simply decommission a solution unless the requirements that  
demanded the solution in the first place are somehow removed.

Per Fatboy Slim:  "You can go with this XOR you can go with that".

Rob