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From: rpw3@rigden.wpd.sgi.com (Rob Warnock)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: 64 bits for times....
Message-ID: <67535@sgi.sgi.com>
Date: 23 Aug 90 01:14:01 GMT
References: <5539@darkstar.ucsc.edu> <13285@yunexus.YorkU.CA> <30728@super.ORG> <26012@bellcore.bellcore.com> <11187@alice.UUCP> <2506@dino.cs.iastate.edu>
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Reply-To: rpw3@sgi.com (Rob Warnock)
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc., Mountain View, CA
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In article <2506@dino.cs.iastate.edu> hascall@cs.iastate.edu
(John Hascall) writes:
+---------------
| }that VMS (i think) has some funny date like 1858 as its epoch, the so-called
| }smithsonian time.
|    VMS keeps time in 64 bits (really 63, negative times are "delta times"), 
|    in 100 nSec units, since 17 Nov 1858 (when the calendar jumped 11 days?).
+---------------

Nice try, but no go. 17 Nov 1858 was the date of the first (recorded) high-
quality astronomical photograph. It is used as Day Zero for quite a few
systems. The DEC PDP-10 also used that as Day Zero, b.t.w. (Didn't CDC, too?)

-Rob

-----
Rob Warnock, MS-9U/510		rpw3@sgi.com		rpw3@pei.com
Silicon Graphics, Inc.		(415)335-1673		Protocol Engines, Inc.
2011 N. Shoreline Blvd.
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