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Re: Internet Draft Final Submission Cut-Off Today

2013-02-28 05:02:39
Hi Brian,

On 2013-02-28 09:05 Brian E Carpenter said:
On 27/02/2013 18:04, Henrik Levkowetz wrote:
Hi Melinda,

On 2013-02-26 23:31 Melinda Shore said:
On 2/26/13 1:25 PM, Paul E. Jones wrote:
Seriously, what the heck is 24:00?  
That one is weird, no doubt about it, but ultimately
it's 23:59 + 1 minute, which is clear.  But I really
think "24:00" is confusing. 0:00 is clearer.  I'm
wondering if they're trying to work around some ferkakte
piece of software.

No, it's just trying to provide a time indication that people
will easily interpret correctly.  Trying out the correct
notation (using 00:00 and the following date) on people
during informal testing, I found that people were much more
prone to interpret that as the deadline being 24 hours later
than was intended.

Strange. Do they think that a train that departs at 00:01
is 23 hours and 59 minutes earlier than one that departs at 00:00?

Probably not:  I think it's the 00:00 which some people tend to
(unconsciously) translate to 'Midnight', and midnight at a certain
date is, exactly as you point out below, somewhat less clear.

However, the phrase "midnight on Monday" is certainly unclear.
I suppose it means 00:00 on Tuesday, but maybe not.

But in any case, while teaching, I chose to set assignment deadlines
at 23:59 for exactly this reason - nothing is completely idiot proof,
but this seems to work out OK.

Ack.  I'll try to get acceptance for that.

Best regards,

        Henrik