> So, dropping leap seconds from UTC would cause these receivers > to, eventually, go back 19 years on cold start? Hardly a major > catastrophe but worth noting.
Ed, There are no proposals to "drop leap seconds" as such. The proposal, as I understand it, is/was to hold leap seconds at their current value. In this case no computer or GPS receiver or cell phone or clock appliance or any man-made timing related intra-planet technology would go forward or back or anything. Observe that nothing will break, for example, if the 12/31/2005 leap second were to not occur. The only problem is that UTC would soon diverge from UT1 beyond 0.9 seconds and so extra-planet devices (e.g., precision telescope systems) would need correction at some point. This introduces a large set of interesting, legitimate, philosophical and financial questions by, especially, astronomers. But either way, nothing with GPS receivers will break. /tvb
