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Re: [bug-gnulib] time64: 64-bit variants of gmtime, mktime, localtime et


From: Bruno Haible
Subject: Re: [bug-gnulib] time64: 64-bit variants of gmtime, mktime, localtime etc?
Date: Thu, 8 Mar 2007 03:06:27 +0100
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Paul Eggert wrote:
> Clearly you don't write financial applications dealing with 30-year
> bonds.  :-)

So you want that 'time64_t' type to be useful specifically for financial
applications? I'm wondering because

   - For computing interests in finance, you rarely need more precision
     than 12 hours. Why 1 sec precision then?

   - For other application areas, such as astronomy, what you need is
     millisecond resolution over a range of several thousand years.
     Yes, a 64-bit integer will suffice here, but you need its base unit
     to be milliseconds, not seconds. And in such areas, you cannot
     neglect the leap seconds. But then, how can you write a function 'gmtime'
     (should better be called 'utctime' anyway) for dates around 2020...2040
     if you don't know the distribution of leap seconds until then?

Nothing against a new data type for financial applications. But then,
please be clear about it, that it's only useful for finance.

Bruno





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