----- Original Message ----- From: [email protected] To: "Nigel Gunn G8IFF/W8IFF" [email protected] Cc: "AMSAT-BB" [email protected] Sent: Friday, April 23, 2010 3:34 PM Subject: [amsat-bb] Re: Was: Arecibo, now confusing math
On Apr 23 2010, Nigel Gunn G8IFF/W8IFF wrote:
Perhaps we should stick to the unambiguous exponential/scientific
notation.
Today's date is 2.01E3:4E0:2.3E1
On 23-Apr-10 11:50, Andrew Glasbrenner wrote:
If you really want to bang your head against the wall at how man can't agree on anything, take a look at the concept of long and short scales:
Unambiguous?
In many parts of the world, today's date would not be 2.01E3/4E0/2.3E1 but rather would be 4E0/2.3E1/2.01E3.2 or 2.3E1/4E0/2.01E3.2 or 2.01E3/2.3E1/4E0
Of course, April 23, 2010 seems clearer than either: 2010/4/23 or 2010/23/4 or 23/4/2010 or 4/23/2010 ...
(IMHO, 2010/23/04 makes most sense, since simple alphabetic sorting of
such
dates also comes out in chronological order, with the most significant digits referring to the biggest chunks - years - and the leas significant digits referring to the smallest chunks - days - but the leading zeros are also critical because you don't want October [10] sorting before March [3] and so it goes!)
Face it, the human race can't agree on anything, except to disagree. 73 de W0JT
Hi ,W0JT
In Italy we use 23/4/2010 or 2.3E1/4E0/2.01E3 or 2.3 x 10^1 / 4 x 10^0 / 2.01 x 10^3
Many years ago AMSAT uses another day numbar and for the AMSAT calendar the AMSAT day 0 = 1 January 1978
73" de
i8CVS Domenico