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Date:      Tue, 18 Jan 2000 17:58:14 +0000 (GMT)
From:      Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com>
To:        andrews@TECHNOLOGIST.COM
Cc:        oogali@intranova.net (Omachonu Ogali), chat@FreeBSD.ORG, eivind@FreeBSD.ORG (Eivind Eklund), mph@astro.caltech.edu (Matthew Hunt)
Subject:   Re: time_t (was Re: I will never trust NBC news again!)
Message-ID:  <200001181758.KAA07986@usr08.primenet.com>
In-Reply-To: <XFMail.000116150238.andrews@TECHNOLOGIST.COM> from "Will Andrews" at Jan 16, 2000 03:02:38 PM

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> > Why isn't it and why can't it be?
> 
> Historical reasons. You're asking the entire computer industry
> to change the standard libraries' use of the time_t typedef.
> time_t starts on January 1, 1970 at 00:00 UTC. People who need
> dates before that can write their own timekeeping libraries
> that can easily "drop in" for their C libraries.
> 
> Banks, crime depts, etc. are only a small portion of the "computer
> user" legion. It would be a completely ridiculous idea to change
> time_t everywhere. I would predict chaos, quite frankly.


time_t is a signed value.


					Terry Lambert
					terry@lambert.org
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.


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