Re: [Tzdist] example json snips for systems that count leap seconds

[Martin Burnicki <[e-mail]>]

Steve Allen wrote:
> Based on the work that Ken Murchison put into his example server at URLs
> https://cyrus-test.andrew.cmu.edu/tzdist/zones/Etc%2FTAI
> https://cyrus-test.andrew.cmu.edu/tzdist/zones/Etc%2FTAI/observances?start=1970-01-01T00:00:00Z&end=2038-01-01T00:00:00Z
> I submit more examples of how tzdist could transport the same sort of
> information which is currently handled by the "right" zones of the IANA
> tzdata and tzcode.

I'm actually pretty busy writing emails to different mailing lists, news 
groups, and customers to explain details of leap seconds. ;-)

So I have to admit that recently I haven't followed the tzdist 
discussions very closely. Anyway, I've just had a look at Steve's JSON 
examples.

Please keep in mind my original intend was to get a list of leap second 
events and an associated expiration date via the tzdist protocol, so 
this information can be used for a number of different things, including 
letting NTP and PTP servers become aware of upcoming leap seconds, do 
UTC-TAI conversions, etc. In this context the "right" timezones are just 
one more application for this leap second table.

I think for the purpose mentioned above the most appropriate format is 
TAI-UTC.json.

 From my own experience I'd say an application programmer who is just 
interested in an enumeration of leaps second events would expect to see 
dates like

   2015-07-01T00:00:00Z

instead of

   2015-07-01T00:00:36Z

for the leap second events. However, if it's made clear that the times 
are TAI, not UTC (is 'Z' correct, then?) this should be no problem. The 
most important thing is that list of leap second events can be extracted 
properly.

Martin