[LEAPSECS] The POSIX Time Rationale - in the Working Group's own words
Poul-Henning Kamp
phk at phk.freebsd.dk
Fri Dec 30 15:20:57 EST 2016
--------
In message <20161230104919472908.1bf7b59d at comcast.net>, Joseph Gwinn writes:
>It may prove useful to know why the POSIX Working Group (WG) excluded
>leap seconds, in their own words.
POSIX didn't "exclude leap seconds", they chose not to "add leap seconds".
I have personally asked Dennis Richie about this detail and his answer was:
"We set the clock when the system booted, from our wrist-watch, in many
cases watches without a second-hand."
--
Poul-Henning Kamp | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20
phk at FreeBSD.ORG | TCP/IP since RFC 956
FreeBSD committer | BSD since 4.3-tahoe
Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by incompetence.
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