A resolution to effectively abolish leap seconds from May 2027, tolerating a drift from Earth’s rotation of up to one hour, is reportedly set to be reviewed at the General Conference on Weights and Measures in France this October.
In the thread, rather than the “one-hour drift” itself — which isn’t expected to occur for hundreds or even thousands of years — commenters focused more on the real-world struggles engineers have faced dealing with leap seconds, worries about the impact on GPS and missile-defense systems, and pointed remarks that this is ultimately just kicking the problem down the road.
Leap Seconds Effectively Abolished from 2027 — Rotation Drift Tolerated Up to “One Hour,” Vote at International Conference in October
A proposal to effectively abolish the “leap second,” which adjusts world standard time in one-second increments, will be reviewed at the General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM), to be held in France October 13–15.
Under the resolution from the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM), if adopted, the world will shift to a “continuous UTC” — one that makes no leap-second adjustments — starting May 20, 2027.
Source: itmedia.co.jp / Original article here
Bet this'll make some people go 'gyaaah!!' lol
If it drifts a whole hour, that's basically daylight saving time territory.
Saying 'I'll be dead by then anyway' feels pretty irresponsible though.
Saying 'I'll be dead by then anyway' feels pretty irresponsible though.
How has everyone even been handling this adjustment up until now?
That's kind of terrifying.
That's kind of terrifying.
If they're not careful, it could mess up computer systems.
Late to work, late delivery, late loan repayment, late settlement — any time-related delay up to an hour is now excusable by blaming Earth's rotation drift.
Long live the slow life!
Long live the slow life!
If noon shifts by a whole hour, wouldn't that seriously mess up weather statistics?
Should've capped it at a minute, at most.
Should've capped it at a minute, at most.
>>1
I could never get along with people who're fine with daylight saving time.
I could never get along with people who're fine with daylight saving time.
Honestly, inserting it right at the date rollover — 23:59:60 — seems like a bad idea, doesn't it?
If it were 10:10:60 instead, you could fudge things a lot more easily.
If it were 10:10:60 instead, you could fudge things a lot more easily.
>>9
Nah, doesn't really change anything fundamental.
Nah, doesn't really change anything fundamental.
Feels like they'll end up just setting Christ's birth as second zero and calling now '63 billion seconds.'
Wouldn't this throw GPS off too?
Car nav is one thing, but if military or mountaineering units get thrown off, isn't that dangerous?
Or is this kept separate from that, and it's purely about the time humans use?
Either way, that sounds like it'd get messy too.
Car nav is one thing, but if military or mountaineering units get thrown off, isn't that dangerous?
Or is this kept separate from that, and it's purely about the time humans use?
Either way, that sounds like it'd get messy too.
>>11
It won't drift.
If anything, since every system implements leap-second insertion differently,
engineers have been coughing up blood trying to prevent drift caused by that — and now that's gone, so three cheers.
It won't drift.
If anything, since every system implements leap-second insertion differently,
engineers have been coughing up blood trying to prevent drift caused by that — and now that's gone, so three cheers.
Flip the thinking around — just artificially correct the Earth's rotation speed itself so no time adjustment is ever needed.
>>13
Marry me.
Marry me.
'If the rotation's gotten slower, then just speed it back up!'
Just adjust it once, at noon on leap day — that'd be enough.
>>17
Leap years aren't adjusted case-by-case — under the Gregorian calendar, whether Feb 29 gets inserted in any given year is fixed far into the future.
It's a completely different concept.
Leap years aren't adjusted case-by-case — under the Gregorian calendar, whether Feb 29 gets inserted in any given year is fixed far into the future.
It's a completely different concept.
Guess this is, in a way, a decision driven by 'outside pressure' too…
if you count the fact that, for the first time on record, Earth's days have been shorter than 24 hours these past few years as 'outside pressure.'
But honestly, isn't this a good outcome? Better that only the industries that actually need to care about the UTC/UT1 gap have to deal with it,
rather than making everyone who touches a system clock worry about it.
if you count the fact that, for the first time on record, Earth's days have been shorter than 24 hours these past few years as 'outside pressure.'
But honestly, isn't this a good outcome? Better that only the industries that actually need to care about the UTC/UT1 gap have to deal with it,
rather than making everyone who touches a system clock worry about it.
If it drifts a whole hour, sunlight and temperature would shift quite a bit.
Correcting it back would be rough too.
Correcting it back would be rough too.
How many thousands of years would it even take to drift a full hour?
Honestly, feels like the current setup was fine as it was.
>>22
Can't be helped — the downsides outweighed the benefits.
Nobody wants system clocks getting fiddled with constantly these days,
let alone attempting, for the first time ever, a leap second adjustment in the reverse direction!
Can't be helped — the downsides outweighed the benefits.
Nobody wants system clocks getting fiddled with constantly these days,
let alone attempting, for the first time ever, a leap second adjustment in the reverse direction!
An hour's drift is at least centuries away,
so by then old systems might have nobody left who can touch them — that could cause even bigger chaos.
If it were capped around a minute, you'd only adjust once every few decades, which still seems manageable.
so by then old systems might have nobody left who can touch them — that could cause even bigger chaos.
If it were capped around a minute, you'd only adjust once every few decades, which still seems manageable.
>>12
How many systems even implement leap seconds these days?
Most just smear the drift via NTP now, don't they?
How many systems even implement leap seconds these days?
Most just smear the drift via NTP now, don't they?
>>26
No such thing exists.
It's not something you can just work out with a simple calculation —
they just sync time based on announcements from international bodies.
No such thing exists.
It's not something you can just work out with a simple calculation —
they just sync time based on announcements from international bodies.
Society can cope with something like a 'leap second' since it's routine, but decades or centuries from now, inserting a 'leap hour' is going to be a bigger mess than the Y2K/Showa-100 bug.
Can system engineers really not foresee that?
Can system engineers really not foresee that?
>>27
Thousands of years from now, today's systems won't exist in any recognizable form.
There's no need to keep the current rule in place until the full one-hour drift actually shows up —
realistically this'll only ever amount to a difference of a few dozen seconds.
Thousands of years from now, today's systems won't exist in any recognizable form.
There's no need to keep the current rule in place until the full one-hour drift actually shows up —
realistically this'll only ever amount to a difference of a few dozen seconds.
If one particular day ends up with an extra hour, whether that hour counts toward work time seems like it could become a real social issue.
They're just bundling the problem up and punting it to the future.
>>30
Fine to punt on this one.
Even after hundreds of years, it might only add up to a few minutes of drift,
and by then the timekeeping system will probably look totally different anyway.
Basically, the real question is what to do over just the next few decades —
and making every system scramble to handle unknown fallout over a UTC/UT1 gap that maxes out at a few dozen seconds is ridiculous.
Fine to punt on this one.
Even after hundreds of years, it might only add up to a few minutes of drift,
and by then the timekeeping system will probably look totally different anyway.
Basically, the real question is what to do over just the next few decades —
and making every system scramble to handle unknown fallout over a UTC/UT1 gap that maxes out at a few dozen seconds is ridiculous.
And on top of that, this 'days shorter than 24 hours' phenomenon has only been observed these past few years in all of recorded history — there's a good chance it reverses within a few decades and days go back to being longer than 24 hours again.
Making every system implement negative leap seconds just for a few years' worth of a phenomenon is just terrible cost-benefit thinking.
I'd get chewed out by my boss for that.
Making every system implement negative leap seconds just for a few years' worth of a phenomenon is just terrible cost-benefit thinking.
I'd get chewed out by my boss for that.
The one-hour figure is just the maximum tolerance —
it's not like they'll actually let the gap grow to a full hour before doing anything.
And the underlying definition of the 'second' itself will probably be replaced by some more precise method before too long anyway.
it's not like they'll actually let the gap grow to a full hour before doing anything.
And the underlying definition of the 'second' itself will probably be replaced by some more precise method before too long anyway.
No way they'd actually let it drift a whole hour lol.
The world's clocks run on NTP these days —
this barely matters outside of stuff like rocket guidance systems.
The world's clocks run on NTP these days —
this barely matters outside of stuff like rocket guidance systems.
I guess as long as the gap between UTC and astronomical time is clearly published, there's no real problem.
Though the world will keep running on UTC regardless…
Though the world will keep running on UTC regardless…
Isn't GPS time just a raw second count since around 1980, meaning leap seconds are really a calendar-processing issue on the receiver's end?
Guess we won't get overtime pay for the leap second anymore.
>>1
In a military context, lots of a nation's people could die, so think about missile interception here.
A junk system whose intercept timing is off by a whole hour is garbage.
Keep corrections down to one second — do your best.
That's the state's duty.
Protect human lives.
In a military context, lots of a nation's people could die, so think about missile interception here.
A junk system whose intercept timing is off by a whole hour is garbage.
Keep corrections down to one second — do your best.
That's the state's duty.
Protect human lives.
Leaving it alone for centuries sounds like it'll cause total chaos whenever it finally happens.
Wouldn't it be better if it happened at least once during a given engineer's working career?
Wouldn't it be better if it happened at least once during a given engineer's working career?
>>45
Nobody said it's being left alone.
All that's been decided is that correction happens once the drift exceeds one hour.
In practice, 'correcting because it drifted an hour' will basically never occur —
by the time it drifts an hour, the systems involved will be fundamentally different anyway.
Nobody said it's being left alone.
All that's been decided is that correction happens once the drift exceeds one hour.
In practice, 'correcting because it drifted an hour' will basically never occur —
by the time it drifts an hour, the systems involved will be fundamentally different anyway.
*This article is compiled from excerpts and a summary of the 5ch (Science News+) thread “Leap Seconds Effectively Abolished from 2027 — Rotation Drift Tolerated Up to “One Hour,” Vote at International Conference in October.”
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