Talk:Epoch (computing)

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midnight is ambiguous

The article states:

“Computing epochs are nearly always specified as midnight Universal Time on some particular date.”

I perceive an ambiguity here, probably stemming from my native understanding: In German, aside from its diffuse poetic meaning, midnight means 24:00 on the previous day, which is equivalent to 00:00 on the following day. In computing, only the latter exists (23:59→00:00). Taking this into account, Unix epoch would start on 1969-12-31 24:00, which is the same actual timestamp, but not the defintion. With a.m./p.m. additionally standard-deviant, it seems ambiguous to me. Wiktionary says it’s “Twelve o'clock at night exactly”, which isn’t definite either; it further suggests to resolve ambiguity by context. Is the intended meaning of “as midnight” perfectly clear for English readers? Or might a parenthesis with “i.e. 00:00” provide appropriate precision? -- WA1TF0R^䷟ 10:36, 20 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that 'midnight' isn't a time. It is a division.

Midnight is where you start 00:00, but none of the time that happens between 00:00 and 00:01 is midnight.

In that sense, the article is correct, because the epoch does begin at the division between 1969-12-31 and 1970-01-01 . 73.238.161.253 (talk) 00:14, 17 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The title "Problems with epoch-based computer time representation" is confusing and redundant.

ALL time systems are epoch based.

Big bang?
Birth of a person?
Revolution?
New Government?

All time systems start on an event.

Is there are way to talk about the legitimate problem of The date value being a fixed number of bits. without making it sound like the problem is caused by epoch-time itself? 73.238.161.253 (talk) 00:41, 16 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Added ML reference.

Epoch is becoming an increasingly-used word in the computer science field, and its emerging meaning has nothing to do with timestamps. Making no mention of its usage in ML or referring searchers to a link containing its ML-oriented meaning leaves a gap in the knowledgebase. Added header pointing users toward the best AI/ML entry I could find that contained the word. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.128.195.114 (talk) 18:09, 27 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]