A warning for FITS y2k implementors

Steve Allen sla at ucolick.borg
Tue Feb 10 18:20:08 EST 1998


In article <6bq7eb$l0o at post.gsfc.nasa.gov>,
William Thompson <thompson at orpheus.nascom.nasa.gov> wrote:
>under certain circumstances, a time such as
>
>       1997-06-30T23:59:60.999
>
>could also be a valid time string, on dates containing leap seconds.

There are few, if any, computer operating systems which implement a
correct model of time.

Therefore extreme caution should be used if new FITS date strings are
to be converted to operating system clock times using standard system
library procedures.
-- 
Steve Allen          UCO/Lick Observatory       Santa Cruz, CA 95064
sla at ucolick.borg     Voice: +1 408 459 3046     FAX (don't): +1 408 454 9863
WWW: http://www.ucolick.borg/~sla               PGP public keys:  see WWW
Junk mail is irrelevant -- my return address has been assimilated.




More information about the fitsbits mailing list