> So GPS doesn’t exactly need leap seconds but it really does care about how long a rotation of the earth takes which… amounts to the same thing.
I don't think this is right. GPS explicitly uses a timebase that does not include leap seconds [1].
On the subject of the article: my modest and very reasonable proposal is that we apply a leap second every six months without fail, dithering between positive and negative leap seconds so as to remain close to sidereal time. That way we would flush out bugs every six months and wouldn't have them accumulate and hit us all at once.
Or we could be boring and use TAI or GPS time as the system clock every where and apply leap second corrections when we go from the system clock (currently UTC) to local time.
I mean, the article is literally about GPS satellites transmitting leap second data as part of their messages. So yes, the basic clock is just counting seconds but leap seconds are a pretty important component of the GOPS model.
I don't think this is right. GPS explicitly uses a timebase that does not include leap seconds [1].
On the subject of the article: my modest and very reasonable proposal is that we apply a leap second every six months without fail, dithering between positive and negative leap seconds so as to remain close to sidereal time. That way we would flush out bugs every six months and wouldn't have them accumulate and hit us all at once.
Or we could be boring and use TAI or GPS time as the system clock every where and apply leap second corrections when we go from the system clock (currently UTC) to local time.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System#Time...