[LEAPSECS] Leap Seconds schedule prior to 1972

[John Sauter]

On Fri, 2016-04-22 at 14:22 -0700, Paul Hirose wrote:
> 
> That term "extraordinary day" is new to me in the context of UTC. Is
> it 
> something you invented? In the paper you use it repeatedly and avoid 
> saying "leap second" until the conclusion, where you propose a name
> for 
> the new time scale ("proleptic UTC with leap seconds").
> 

I did invent the term "extraordinary day".  I tried to avoid the term
"leap second" because I was concerned that the term would cause
confusion among those new to the subject.  A "leap year" is a year with
an extra day.  A day with an extra second should therefore be called a
"leap day", but instead we call the extra second a "leap second".  Then
there is the "negative leap second", when we have a day of 86,399
seconds.

To avoid what I felt was confusing terminology I invented two kinds of
"extraordinary day", one with 86,399 seconds and the other with 86,401
seconds.  A day with 86,400 seconds is an "ordinary day".
    John Sauter (John_Sauter at systemeyescomputerstore.com)
-- 
PGP fingerprint = E24A D25B E5FE 4914 A603  49EC 7030 3EA1
9A0B 511E

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 473 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
URL: <https://pairlist6.pair.net/pipermail/leapsecs/attachments/20160422/c946d84d/attachment.pgp>