Re: [art] Predictable Internet Time

[Nico Williams <[e-mail]>]

On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 12:07:38PM -0700, Joe Touch wrote:
> On 3/28/2017 12:00 PM, Nico Williams wrote:
> >> AFAICT, wouldn't specing Unix interfaces to the different times below be
> >> out of scope for the IETF?
> > Yes and no.
> >
> > First, the IETF has and does specify some APIs.  (BSD sockets bindings
> > for IPv6, GSS-API, and various others.)
> 
> Only network APIs, AFAICT>

Network protocols often depend on or relate to time, thus there's a
nexus.

> > Regardless, how could we address our time issues without specifying what
> > amounts to.. type conversions? 
>
> *our* time issues are mostly that we need to know the time frame being
> used, and to appreciate that there's no single solution that can be used
> to calculate intervals AND correspond to civil time that avoids the need
> for constantly-updated external information. No closed system is
> sufficient for that.

If you can keep track of who needs time in what form...

And if you can't... then what's the point of adding PIT?

> > ...
> >
> > Obviously, for leap second smearing, besides an API there is also
> > behavior (smearing).
> 
> I sincerely hope we can stop referring to this nonstandard technique. We
> certainly cannot even consider standardizing a conversion (even if that
> were our purview) between time scales that include smearing until there
> are smearing standards.

Agreed.

> A key point in this doc is that smearing makes things horribly worse,
> not better in any way, except to delude users into thinking otherwise.

Agreed!

Nico
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