Klarinet Archive - Posting 000125.txt from 2000/01

From: "Mark Charette" <charette@-----.org>
Subj: Re: [kl] Re: [[kl] Re: Y2K]
Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 18:53:44 -0500

From: "Christian Budde" <budde@-----.de>
> I am wondering, which lousy programmer would care about the exception to
> drop a leap year every 100 years and not care about the 400-years rule?
> This does not make sense, keeping in mind that computers were invented
> only in the second half of this, sorry last, century. The simple rule for
> a leap year every four years would last till 2100.

At least 2 reasons:
1) Most programmers use "canned" libraries and subroutines for date
calculations, which are always harder than you think (there are many devious
ways to calculate pay periods :^)
2) Some textbooks neglect to mention the 400 year rule.

As to computers being invented in the last half of the last century - go
back to your history books. They've been around a bit longer than that.
Babbages analytical engine (the first 1/7th of it) was assembled and
demonstrated in 1832, a bit before the 1st half of the last century. A bit
before the 1st half of this century (1945) ENIAC had its final assembly.

The 21st century starts at the beginning of next year.

Mark C.

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