[ntp:hackers] smearing the leap second

Warner Losh imp at bsdimp.com
Fri Jul 10 15:56:43 UTC 2015


> On Jul 10, 2015, at 4:08 AM, Mike S <mikes at flatsurface.com> wrote:
> 
> On 7/9/2015 9:03 PM, Hal Murray wrote:
>> Actually, if you are going to do smearing, NTP is a fine place to do it.  It
>> lets you implement smearing without all the effort and risks of updating the
>> kernels on all[1] your client systems.
> 
> ...and THAT is exactly why some systems still have problems with leap seconds, over 40 years after they first appeared - people who do things incorrectly for the sake of ease and/or expedience, instead of doing them correctly.

Coupled with the attitude of “it’s only a second, why should I care?” It seems the whole enterprise is working around the fact that leap seconds break the fundamental assumption that we all learned in school that minutes always have 60 seconds. An assumption that goes back a very long time.

Warner

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