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From: clyde@reed.UUCP (Clyde Bryja)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Re: Stardate
Message-ID: <2628@reed.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 28-Feb-86 01:48:28 EST
Article-I.D.: reed.2628
Posted: Fri Feb 28 01:48:28 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Mar-86 22:44:00 EST
References: <593@bentley.UUCP> <391@ur-tut.UUCP>
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Organization: Reed College, Portland, Oregon
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> In article <593@bentley.UUCP> kwh@bentley.UUCP (KW Heuer) writes:
> >How long is a "starday", i.e. the difference between Stardate 1234.0
> >and Stardate 1235.0?  I suspect it's inconsistent (someone once told
> >me that the first digit is the number of seasons the show has been on),
> >but can someone find an "official" definition?
> >Karl W. Z. Heuer (ihnp4!bentley!kwh), The Walking Lint

I don't know what the "official" definition is, but I can offer one of
my own that I have come to feel fairly comfortable with.  I take the
stardate to be the last four figures of the Julian date.  The Julian
date system is used by astronomers world wide to reference astronomical
events.  Day one was sometime before 4000 B.C.  I only know the first
four figures of the current Julian date of the top of my head.  Astronomers
would denote today as JD2446XXX (where the X's are whatever they happen to
be).  It is not uncommen practice in astronomical writings to drop the
first three digits of this after they have been fully given for the first
observation.  Thus, an observational astronomer may write that "minima of
this eclipsing binary system were observed to occur at JD2445720.67, 5721.62,
5722.57, etc."  I like to call the latter entries "stardate format."  It is,
of course, not a good format to use if the interval between events in on
the order of decades (10,000 days is somewhat over 30 years), but otherwise
it serves very well.

It makes sense to me that this would be the "stardate" of the show.  The
first three digits of the full date would assumed known for each log entry.
After all, if I type "March 5" right now, everyone assumes that I mean 1986--
right?  Asking the identity of a 10,000 day time span is 1/3 as bad as
asking what century it is.  If I say that I was born in '64, people assume
that I mean 1964-- right?

Anyway, that's my interpretation (for what it's worth).


-- 
+++++++++++
"For Easter Day is Christmas time,		Clyde Bryja
 And far away is near,				Box 21, Reed College
 And two and two is more than four,		Portland, OR	97202
 And over there is here."