> Further to previous comment on this, I received this from Eastgate:
>
>> Yes, the Mac has a new date format that can handle older and newer
>> dates. We'll switch presently.
>
> I'm sure the last comment alludes to the fact it's not necessarily a simple
> change from one date method to another.
I imagine it is related to the underlying numerical type (i.e. kind of
variable ) a date stored in.
So changing it means code changes...
It wouldn't surprise me if the windows methods are also different.
The 1904 date is kept in a 32 bit integer, Excel has a similar issue.
It is very reasonable in terms of dates for file stamps; but not for a
general date variable inside a system.
Some systems/ applications use 8 byte real numbers to store dates.
Examples would be SAS and Oracle. They keep the concept of an origin for
dates (for SAS it is 1 Jan 1960) and dates before that are simply negative
numbers internally.
Of course the problem these systems have is they use Gregorian dates, and
since the dates of conversion from Julian dates varied all over Europe, they
don't match published dates exactly.
I have a lot of sympathy for anyone trying to create timelines from
literature & original sources...
-- -- Dave Garbutt Ingelsteinweg 4d CH 4143 Dornach +41 79 326 8970 (Home: 061 692 6349) http://www.mybasel.ch/verkehr_regioplan_karte.cfm?ID=Strassen,14139&ParaZoom &Zoom=3000 Musicıs like breathing out. Everything else is like inhaling. Neil Young (Quoted in Shakey, by Jimmy McDonough)Received on Sun Aug 27 2006 - 10:24:55 EDT
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