[LEAPSECS] UTC Redefinition Advanced

[Jonathan E. Hardis]

On Oct 22, 2010, at 1:16 PM, Rob Seaman wrote:


>  It will, for instance, cost astronomers many millions of dollars  

> simply to restore current functionality to thousands of  

> interoperating systems.


Oh ... come, come.

How do these "thousands of interoperable systems" currently get the  
time?

You're free to insert an inexpensive interface box between your data  
source and the systems that use the data that adds or subtracts  
however many integer number of seconds you wish.  For example, it  
would be trivial to set a private collection of NTP servers that  
provide a well-documented time offset from other NTP servers that  
maintain UTC.

In other words, if you want a time scale that preserves leap seconds,  
you're perfectly free to maintain one yourself for astronomical  
purposes -- whether or not the rest of the world follows suit.

    - Jonathan