Talk:Decimal time

message: A short note -- the mention of Microsoft Excel time equivalent was removed because, in this person's opinion, an encyclopedia should not be making reference to proprietary numerical systems that could change and render the page inaccurate.
:Welcome to Wikipedia.  This is a wiki, not printed paper volumes that are updated once a decade.  Wikipedia changes every second of every day, and there are many pages devoted to proprietary systems.  There is a whole article already on Microsoft Excel, for instance.  (Not that Excel's serial dates have changed much since they copied them from Lotus 1-2-3 two decades ago, anyway.)  Please see Wikipedia Policies and guidelines for information about what is appropriate.
:Also, it's better to add notes to the bottom of the page, not to the middle, under an unrelated section heading.  And the guidelines also recommend signing your notes with the meta tag ~~~~, which inserts your name and date/time, rather than posting anonymously; otherwise, it appears to part of the following comments, which were posted by someone else last year.  While I'm at it, it's also recommended that you register a username. -- Nike 01:13, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rewrite 

message: Merging of a minor fraction of the content of Decimalization of time of day was accomplished earlier this month by copy and paste, with the history being overwritten with a rdr instead of merging it. I am performing the belated history merge, and recording here which edits were made under the name that has been turned into a rdr.
Since the history of Decimal time runs close to 200 entries, and the four entries of Decimalization of time of day's have only the merging edit of Decimal time interposing itself between any two of them, there is no benefit to copying here the whole pre-merge history of the older & non-rdr'd article.
Note Well: The undelete portion of the delete-move-undelete sequence apparently takes some time to be effective; until then the self redirect will be the most recent version available.  A reversion to the 15 September 2005 revision may be necessary when it again becomes available.
OK, there it is; reverting momentarily.--Jerzy•t 18:47, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Documentation of History Merge (2005 Sept) 

message: This obsession to convert everything to decimal is misguided.  Decimal is an arbitrary and not very useful number base.  The time system as it exists is much more useful than decimal, because it's easy to divide minutes or hours into into 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 parts, or to divide days into 2, 3, 4 or 6 parts.  With decimal you're limited to dividing your time periods evenly by 2, 5, and maybe 4.
We should change our number base, rather than our time system.  See the Duodecimal, or "dozenal" system.
:What does any of this have to do with the article?  As it says on the Wikipedia:Talk page:
::Wikipedians generally oppose the use of talk pages just for the purpose of partisan talk about the main subject. Wikipedia is not a soapbox, it's an encyclopedia. In other words, talk about the article, not about the subject.
:There are other places online to attack the decimal system.  If you want to post here, how about telling us specifically what you would change about the article?  Also, you should sign your posts, so we know who is saying what and when; just type four tildes (~~~~) at the end of your message. --Nike 05:48, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, the history page says it was 198.107.49.206 - of course maybe this is not the point. --gwc 04:48, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

text: This talk page is for discussing this article itself, not for diatribes supporting or opposing decimal time. (There is a warning at the top of many Wikipedia talk pages that the talk page is for discussing how to develop and improve said article, not “for general discussion of the article's subject.”) Also, please no inflammatory language; it violates NPOV, is unprofessional, may turn people away from Wikipedia, and certainly does not serve the purposes of an encyclopedia. Per NPOV, this article, in turn, is not for arguing for or against decimal time, but for a general description of the subject. I myself, for instance, strongly support decimal time, for many reasons, in part because it is in line with the decimal nature of the rest of the metric system.--Solomonfromfinland (talk) 23:45, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stop the decimal insanity 

message: :Decimal time was said to have been introduced in Ancient Egypt
Was said by whom?  Do you have any sources? MvR 16:26, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ancient Egypt 

message: How was the zero point of French Revolutionary Time determined?  Was it based on:
* GMT plus one standard hour
* GMT plus some round figure in decimal hours
* Paris Mean Time
* the mean solar time at the locality where it was used
* something else entirely?
Moreover, did they ever try to share their idea with the world?  And if so, did they intend other parts of the world to adapt it into their own local time, or to follow their time in the style of Swatch Internet Time, or what? -- Smjg 15:23, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Timezone of FRT 

message: The reference to the apparent decimal time system used in the futuristic dystopia depicted in Metropolis is interesting if it is factual. However, evidence needs to be cited to back up the argument that the decimal clock portrayed in the film represents a lengthening of the standard work shift from 8 to 10 hours (if a work shift of 8 hours was indeed standard in 1927 Germany). 
Also, the supporting statement: "Since a normal day cannot be divided into a whole number of such shifts, a 24-hour clock is displayed above the shift clock to give the actual time of day" is either incorrect or misleading. The 24-hour clock may be there for any reason Lang imagined it, perhaps to help workers acclimate to the decimal system. More importantly, the 20-decihour day can be evenly divided into 2 half-day shifts of 10 decihours each, making each shift (by our reckoning) 12 hours long. It's a draconian labor practice, but German weapons factories at the time the film was made did operate on a two-shift system, rather than the three-shift system we're accustomed to today. Rangergordon (talk) 10:38, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Decimal Times in Fritz Lang's ''Metropolis'' 

message: There is currently a revert war on this talk page.  The problem is that someone is repeatedly removing historical content.  This is totally inappropriate.  The claim is that the discussion somehow violates copyright.  In fact, there are few details about the supposedly copyrighted material, and discussion about such material is not itself a violation of copyright, but rather fair use.  Much of the deleted material was written by myself, and by others who did not consent to the deletion.  You do not have the right to violate our free speech through your censorship.  Such deletions are in violation of WP policy and will be reverted every time.  I will also discuss this on my blog, which you cannot delete. --Nike (talk) 22:37, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I removed any references to my copyrighted material that I could find, and inadvertently also removed text which I did not intend to remove, so I reverted the "rewrite" text. My apologies for the misunderstanding. There will be no further edits on my part, so long as no material of mine reappears. Best regards213.100.87.94 (talk) 23:28, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: This is the text I have removed: "Here's the "prodecimal" section, which I couldn't find a reference to even on Google. Some of this has a source (included), but other parts seem very "inside baseball" and more like minutiae of interest only to Andre Fischer fans. Who's Andre Fischer anyway?! --Dablaze 07:43, Aug 14, 2004 (UTC)
How can you tell me that the copyrighted material was removed years ago when there is clearly a link to it under---"Archived text of Prodecimal system". Posting this text is unacceptable to me, and quite frankly also totally irrelevant to the discussion of Decimal time, so simply leave this text out of the discussion so that I no longer have to keep removing it, please. regards,213.100.87.94 (talk) 12:50, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Talk Reverts 

message: Why was the link to the Decimal Time Applet removed and replaced on 30 June 2011? The existing link was relevant and produced the correct decimal time (for me at least). I can understand adding a new link but why remove a relevent link? --Stevep99 (talk) 12:26, 9 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Link Removal 

message: An image used in this article, , has been nominated for speedy deletion at Wikimedia Commons for the following reason: Copyright violations 
;What should I do?
Don't panic; deletions can take a little longer at Commons than they do on Wikipedia. This gives you an opportunity to contest the deletion (although please review Commons guidelines before doing so). The best way to contest this form of deletion is by posting on the image talk page.
* If the image is non-free then you may need to upload it to Wikipedia (Commons does not allow fair use)
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* If the image has already been deleted you may want to try Commons Undeletion Request
This notification is provided by a Bot --CommonsNotificationBot (talk) 06:56, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: File:Horloge-republicaine0.jpg Nominated for speedy Deletion

message: In the section "Decimal Year" with definition and conversion table; I believe "More exactly, a year is 365.25 days long, so a tenth of the year is 36.525 days (36 days, 12 hours, 36 minutes)" should use the more accurate 365.24 days per year. This is no more confusing while marginally more precise and informative. If so, the tabular values should also be adjusted. 
:More exactly, a year is 365.24 days long, so a tenth of the year is 36.524 days (36 days, 12 hours, 35 minutes)
(or 34.56 minutes). If necessary references can easily link to other Wikipedia topics. I leave this for consensus by others more expert than I. HalFonts (talk) 02:38, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Since 1984, the astronomical year used for calculations has been the Julian year containing exactly 365.25 days, not the tropical or Besselian year used before 1984, about 365.2422 days, which I assume you approximated as 365.24 days. — Joe Kress (talk) 07:22, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

text: The use determines the approximation. If the mean tropical year is under discussion, then an approximation of 365.24 days might be appropriate. But the decimal year is under discussion here, and astronomical epochs within a year have used the Julian year since 1984. Before 1984, the Besselian year, a kind of mean tropical year, was used. Epochs wihin both years were specified as decimal fractions of a year. These epochs are used whenever some variable changes over the course of a year, requiring the position within a year to be specified, where 2000.0 means the beginning of that year whereas 2000.5 means the middle of that year. The change was necessary because the mean tropical year changes from year-to-year and even within a particular year, making calulations using it inherently imprecise. The Julian year was chosen because it is a simple approximation of a calendar year, even simpler than an average Gregorian year of 365.2425 days (changing to an Egyptian year of exactly 365 days would have been too extreme). Furthermore, the day within the Julian year contains exactly 86400 SI seconds, avoiding the variable length of the day over various time scales from days to millennia, again a change needed for precision. The days within the former Besselian year were variable mean solar days instead of uniform SI days now used. — Joe Kress (talk) 00:08, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Decimal Year 

message: Might be appropriate to make them into a single article: Metric time. Interlaker (talk) 14:52, 19 March 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: The Metric time article is primarily about time units in the metric system.  I know that decimal time is sometimes erroneously called metric time, but it is not a part of the metric system, and fear that merging them would encourage confusion. --Nike (talk) 05:57, 22 March 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merge with Metric Time article? 

message: Someone added an external link which appears totally unsuitable, for several reasons.  I looked at the other links, and all of them also have issues.  One of them had a 404 error, so I removed it. (Another had an expired certificate that my computer blocked.) I see the value of demonstrating decimal time, but don't know of any links that aren't original research or have other issues. Perhaps we could just show the decimal time with a template and not use any external links. --Nike (talk) 08:45, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  External Links 

message: Sirs,
The said clock Decimal Clock (Decimal date and time Java JRE by Grant Hardy.) meets and is added based on your own criteria in response to a user in Nike's talk page, as
quote begins
:Because the application in question does not relate to the article.  Read the article.  Metric units of time are the second, kilosecond, millisecond, etc.  The metric system specifies time interval, not time of day.  Your clock actually displays decimal time of day, not metric time.
:Also, just because someone else does something does not make it right.  Read the manual of style.  Links are supposed to have information about the subject of the article, not advertise applications which are not even related to the article. 
quote ends 
Please do not undo my edits 86.31.47.92 (talk) 09:44, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: First of all, the page you linked is not specifically about decimal time. Rather, the title is "Messiah Decimal Calendar to make Modern Time keeping More Precise", and it's all original research, which is not allowed on Wikipedia. Secondly, you are referring to some Java apps which must be downloaded and run on a user's own computer; the first one has a bunch of unexplained things which may or may not be related to decimal time, and does not seem to be correlated with any version of decimal time I'm aware of. The "analogue clock" won't even run on my computer. I'm guessing it's "Messiah's Time", which is original research and/or not notable.  Again, please read the Wikipedia link policies, which you link to above. --Nike (talk) 17:50, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

text: It requires Java...in other words, it runs afoul of WP:ELNO #8. Yet another reason the link should not be included. —C.Fred (talk) 02:52, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

text: Yes, it links to an HTML page, which is in itself a problem, because the content contains original research, and is not primarily related to the article. You give the link title as "Decimal Clock", which is deceptive because the actual title is "Messiah Decimal Calendar to make Modern Time keeping More Precise". And I see that the clock app has been fixed and an image inserted since I last looked, which suggests that it may have happened in response to discussion here. Since you are anonymous, there is no way to determine that you are not affiliated with the web site in question, and therefore self-promoting. "Adding external links to an article or user page for the purpose of promoting a website or a product is not allowed, and is considered to be spam." Linking to your own content could be a conflict of interest. There are many sites which have decimal clocks and don't require files be downloaded. In fact, for the past 15 years I, myself, have had an entire web site dedicated to decimal time, with a number of decimal clock Java applets and JavaScript widgets, but I have avoided linking to it in the article because that would be self-promotion, so I cannot be an unbiased judge. (If someone else thinks it should be included, that's different.) --Nike (talk) 23:02, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Link to decimal time clock 

message: I'm not sure whether it's relevant for this article, but when I read it I came to think of how speed skating results are handled.  When a 500 m competition, for example in the Olympics, is run, each skater run the distance twice and the times are added.  Say that a skater runs once in 35 s and once in 36 s.  The result is then written as 71 s, not as 1 min 11 s or something alike.
Also the samalog rules used in speed skating competitions and statistics might qualify as a kind of decimal time.  Fomalhaut76 (talk) 07:54, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use within speed skating  

message: My first ever edit on wikipedia, ten years ago, was to add a conversions section, which survives to this day but happily much improved. The incremental improvements and expansions on wikipedia through its history have been amazing. Let noone say that that wikipedia is not a fantastic place. :-) --Nanite (talk) 23:05, 25 November 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  A fun little note 

message: I'm trying to figure out which time zone I would be in when decimal time is finally seen as sane and "why didn't we do this sooner?". Taking current longitude (118*W; Pacific Time Zone) and dividing by 36, gives me 3.2778. Question is, do I round up (to 4 in this case; knock the bits off to the right of the decimal point), am I in the third time zone (keep the bits to the right of the decimal point), or should I figure it out via International Date Line (where 10:00:00/00:00:00 would be)?
108.13.17.82 (talk) 23:00, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: There is no such thing as decimal time zones. You are free to devise any system you like, as original research, for your personal use, but it would have no notable use, and thus be outside the scope of Wikipedia. If you wish to discuss the issue further, you should look for an appropriate forum, or ask me on my personal talk page. --Nike (talk) 04:13, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Decimal Time Zones

message: I've used the decimal system for over 30 years in my professional work and never seen this term, probably because it was obsolete before I was born. More useful and used are decasecond and heptosecond, but we don’t introduce these. By the time we get to kilosecond  (a little over 1/4 hour), we shift to units of minutes, hours, days, or whatever is appropriate. I think this bit of historical trivia should be deleted or replaced. Someone has engaged in an exposition of their erudition IMHO.Sbalfour (talk) 19:01, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: So far as I know, this is original research, and nobody has actually used or proposed myriasecond. --Nike (talk) 04:36, 13 November 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Myriasecond? 

message: In modern representation of time of day, colons (:) are used to separate sexigesimal divisions, especially in English-speaking countries. In historical documents, units were typically followed by their names, or abbreviations thereof, i.e. hours, minutes, and seconds (hms). This is still practiced in francophone countries. In addition, sometimes the superscripts that are still used for sexigesimal divisions of angular degrees was used for time of day, e.g. 12h 0' 0". These same methods were also used to represent decimal time of day during the Revolution. An example with abbreviations may be seen in the article: 9 h. 92 m. 
An example of the alternate representation: à 3h 86’, which is also represented as 0,386 or 0j386, that is, 3 decimal hours 86 decimal minutes, or 0.386 day.
Does anyone know when and how colons were introduced?
--Nike (talk) 04:28, 13 November 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Historic representation 

message: There is a website from the decimal time association with a decimal time clock and calendar: decimal-time.org.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.191.128.242 (talk) 17:26, 7 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Decimal time association & Decimal time clock and calendar 

message: I think the example of aviation using decimal hours is a poor one, as this is not a common thing across the rest of aviation in my experience. The example given is specifically the recording of flight time in the Pilot's Logbook which is an official legal document which can be used to verify things like currency requirements (minimum recent flight experience needed to perform certain operations, etc.) so the fact that this is recorded in decimal hours and fractions thereof is convenient as it makes it quick to manually total up. But the PRIMARY reason this is done is that typically it's a record of the engine total operating time meter in the plane (often referred to as the Hobbs Meter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobbs_meter) which records a continuous non-resettable count of hours and (generally) tenths of hours. But such meters and their recording for maintenance or other purposes is not specific to aviation but is very common across many electro-mechanical systems (engines of all sorts, mainframe computers and some peripherals, etc.) so I feel the current entry will make people think this is some general feature of aviation and I don't think that's the case. 2601:245:4100:B781:C53D:3AB:992B:444F (talk) 00:23, 14 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Aviation example seems poor 

message: What is this? The only source is a personal GitHub page, so it appears to be personal research, as well as not notable, and therefore needs to be deleted, unless shown to be otherwise. ------  L'an CCXXXI De la Republique francaise une et indivisible Le Six frimaire à Deux heures Neuf Décimes temps moyen du Paris Nike (talk) 06:51, 27 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Epoch Day 

message: Some of the dates seem to be incorrect (off-by-ones?):
Table: 
Mar 15, Apr 20, May 27, Aug 8, Sep 13, Oct 20, Nov 25.
Suggested correction:
Mar 14, Apr 19, May 26, Aug 7, Sep 12, Oct 19, Nov 24.
Other dates and times seem to be correct. Grateful if somebody could verify this? Domschl (talk) 12:15, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: The table is correct. Remember, the first day of the year is 0, so 73 is March 15. — J2023.443565 Nike (talk) 06:18, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible mistake in table "Conversion between decimal years and date (in a common year)"