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Groups > comp.lang.java.programmer > #24510

Re: About java program.

From Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid>
Newsgroups comp.lang.java.programmer
Subject Re: About java program.
Date 2013-06-22 13:30 +0000
Organization A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID <kq48td$9qk$1@dont-email.me> (permalink)
References (9 earlier) <rK3wt.42579$f_1.22147@newsfe05.iad> <kpsfn7$k9k$1@dont-email.me> <oYOwt.19280$9m5.18160@newsfe26.iad> <kq0k30$ubf$1@dont-email.me> <Gq8xt.62041$5i1.57182@newsfe15.iad>

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On Fri, 21 Jun 2013 23:59:41 -0300, Arved Sandstrom wrote:

> Ahhh, dates. :-) Just this last fall had to bypass front ends for a
> mainstream financial system and get at the DB directly. No docs worth a
> damn, not even a good data dictionary for the database, so I had to use
> the front end programs to generate DB activity of the sort I wanted
> while I ran a SQL Server profiler trace. I cleaned up the trace and
> looked at the dates...what is this, I thought? Integer numbers in the
> seven hundred thousands. It took a bit of sleuthing to find out that it
> was rata die dates.
>
Thats interesting: there are evidently scads of different (and mutually 
incompatible date representations of this type. Previously I knew about 
four (listed in the order I learnt about them):

- the proprietary 'ICL 1900 date', based on 31/12/1899 and enumerated in
  24 bit signed integers, so the time is a separate issue and with its
  rollover event ocurring in  24866 AD.

- the proprietary 'ICL 2900 date, held as as signed 64 bit integer and
  enumerated in microseconds, so includes the time. I've never known what
  the base date was but its scarcely relevant since it will only roll over
  after 292271 years.

- the 'Julian Day', based on noon GMT on January 1, 4713 BC and
  enumerated as days held as a real number with the fractional part
  representing the time of day. The base date comes from the Julian
  calendar.

- the UNIX data, held in 32 bits and enumerated in seconds since 00:00
  on 01/01/1970 with a rollover in 2038.

It also turns out that the format that IBM calls the 'Julian Date' (yyddd) 
isn't the same as the Julian Day.

And now there's 'rata die' which I'd not previously heard of. It is 
similar to the Julian Day except that it is based on midnight in the 
local time zone on the 1st of Jan, 1AD. It is held as a real number, with 
the fractional part representing the time of day. However, there are 
variants: the second uses integers to represent whole days, i.e. its the 
first form with the fractional part discarded, and the third is also an 
integer, but defined to represent midday.

> There is no clean way of doing rata die <-> java.util.Calendar
> conversions. And that nasty little 0.5 day floating point adjustment is
> a bugger. It's only now after 9 months of production that I have a warm
> fuzzy about the thing being solid.
>
I'm not surprised. In fact there's no clean way to convert an arbitrary 
historic date to any of these representations or to a Gregorian date 
without using a lookup table holding the discontinuities and corrections 
that have been applied to all human calendars at some time or other. And, 
it you want to convert times, where they are known, as well it just turns 
into a can of worms before the invention of the railway and the 
introduction of the railway timetable.
 

-- 
martin@   | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org       |

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Thread

About java program. rajbhaumik@gmail.com - 2013-06-15 13:38 -0700
  Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-06-15 16:50 -0400
  Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-06-16 01:12 +0200
    Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-16 14:21 +0100
      Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-06-16 17:28 +0200
        Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-16 19:52 +0100
          Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-06-16 15:50 -0400
        Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-17 09:36 +0100
        Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-17 09:49 -0300
          Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-17 14:46 +0100
            Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-17 13:32 -0300
            Re: About java program. Joerg Meier <joergmmeier@arcor.de> - 2013-06-17 20:32 +0200
              Re: About java program. Eric Sosman <esosman@comcast-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-17 14:49 -0400
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-17 18:38 -0300
                Re: About java program. Eric Sosman <esosman@comcast-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-17 18:30 -0400
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-18 17:33 -0300
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-04 22:56 -0400
                Re: About java program. Daniele Futtorovic <da.futt.news@laposte-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-18 00:13 +0200
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-18 17:50 -0300
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-19 08:50 +0100
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-19 15:16 -0300
                Re: About java program. Lew <lewbloch@gmail.com> - 2013-06-19 16:20 -0700
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-07 13:31 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-07 18:16 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-07 19:21 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-07 20:07 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-07 20:21 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-07 20:40 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-07 22:20 -0400
                Re: About java program. Lew <lewbloch@gmail.com> - 2013-07-07 21:47 -0700
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-08 06:58 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-08 08:07 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-08 08:58 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-08 09:18 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-08 09:47 -0400
                Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-07-08 10:07 -0400
                Re: About java program. Daniele Futtorovic <da.futt.news@laposte-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-19 16:42 +0200
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-20 23:33 -0300
                Re: About java program. Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2013-06-21 04:16 +0000
                Re: About java program. Joerg Meier <joergmmeier@arcor.de> - 2013-06-21 12:27 +0200
                Re: About java program. Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2013-06-21 21:14 +0000
                Re: About java program. Joerg Meier <joergmmeier@arcor.de> - 2013-06-21 23:37 +0200
                Re: About java program. Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2013-06-21 23:42 +0000
                Re: About java program. Gene Wirchenko <genew@telus.net> - 2013-06-24 13:00 -0700
                Re: About java program. Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2013-06-24 21:29 +0000
                Re: About java program. Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2013-06-24 21:42 +0000
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-21 23:59 -0300
                Re: About java program. Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2013-06-22 13:30 +0000
                Re: About java program. Daniele Futtorovic <da.futt.news@laposte-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-21 16:24 +0200
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-21 22:39 -0300
                Re: About java program. Daniele Futtorovic <da.futt.news@laposte-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-22 19:25 +0200
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-22 19:41 +0100
                Re: About java program. Daniele Futtorovic <da.futt.news@laposte-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-23 03:53 +0200
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-23 09:21 +0100
                Re: About java program. Daniele Futtorovic <da.futt.news@laposte-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-24 18:57 +0200
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-24 18:14 +0100
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-22 09:03 +0100
                Re: About java program. Daniele Futtorovic <da.futt.news@laposte-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-22 19:26 +0200
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-22 18:51 +0100
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-04 22:58 -0400
                Re: About java program. Joerg Meier <joergmmeier@arcor.de> - 2013-06-19 00:38 +0200
                Re: About java program. Eric Sosman <esosman@comcast-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-06-18 18:56 -0400
                Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-18 21:26 -0300
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-06-19 21:20 +0200
                Re: About java program. Sven Köhler <remove-sven.koehler@gmail.com> - 2013-06-20 11:23 +0300
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-06-20 19:18 +0200
                Re: About java program. blmblm@myrealbox.com <blmblm.myrealbox@gmail.com> - 2013-07-15 20:20 +0000
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-19 09:14 +0100
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-19 09:11 +0100
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-04 23:11 -0400
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-07-05 09:13 +0100
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-07-05 23:15 +0200
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-05 22:03 -0400
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-07-06 13:01 +0200
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-07-06 13:43 +0100
                Re: About java program. Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2013-07-06 14:17 +0000
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-06 16:18 -0400
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-07-06 21:42 +0100
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-07-06 09:16 +0100
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-07-06 13:14 +0200
                Re: About java program. Eric Sosman <esosman@comcast-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-07-06 08:22 -0400
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-07-07 20:43 +0200
                Re: About java program. Eric Sosman <esosman@comcast-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-07-07 18:07 -0400
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-07 19:35 -0400
                Re: About java program. Eric Sosman <esosman@comcast-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-07-07 20:42 -0400
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-07-08 20:50 +0200
                Re: About java program. Eric Sosman <esosman@comcast-dot-net.invalid> - 2013-07-08 15:01 -0400
                Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-07-08 23:29 +0200
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-06 16:27 -0400
                Re: About java program. Lew <lewbloch@gmail.com> - 2013-07-06 13:41 -0700
                Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-05 21:59 -0400
              Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-17 21:06 +0100
            Re: About java program. Joshua Cranmer 🐧 <Pidgeot18@verizon.invalid> - 2013-06-17 17:36 -0500
              Re: About java program. Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2013-06-18 08:24 +0200
              Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-18 09:03 +0100
                Re: About java program. Joshua Cranmer 🐧 <Pidgeot18@verizon.invalid> - 2013-06-18 13:07 -0500
                Re: About java program. Lew <lewbloch@gmail.com> - 2013-06-18 14:48 -0700
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-19 08:36 +0100
              Re: About java program. Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom2@eastlink.ca> - 2013-06-18 23:33 -0300
                Re: About java program. lipska the kat <"nospam at neversurrender dot co dot uk"> - 2013-06-19 08:34 +0100
            Re: About java program. Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2013-07-04 22:53 -0400
  Re: About java program. Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2013-06-16 07:04 -0700
  Re: About java program. Jeff Higgins <jeff@invalid.invalid> - 2013-06-18 04:06 -0400

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