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0000 is a valid time.


Butters

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Why does DOD continue to insist on starting operations 1 minute after midnight? Everything thing I see is 0001. Do we magically skip a minute every night and I have been missing this al along? So I ask the question and these are the answers I received.

1. 0000 is not a valid time.

2. 2400 is midnight not 0000.

3. The computer does not understand 0000

4. 0000 confuses people.

Everyone, look at your digital watch. 1 second after 2359 and 59 seconds, the watch will read 0000 not 0001. Since we live in a post Y2K world, computers do understand 0000.

Make the madness stop. Insist on using 0000.

Edited by Nole_96
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Why does DOD continue to insist on starting operations 1 minute after midnight? Everything thing I see is 0001. Do we magically skip a minute every night and I have been missing this al along? So I ask the question and these are the answers I received.

1. 0000 is not a valid time.

2. 2400 is midnight not 0000.

3. The computer does not understand 0000

4. 0000 confuses people.

Everyone, look at your digital watch. 1 second after 2359 and 59 seconds, the watch will read 0000 not 0001. Since we live in a post Y2K world, computers do understand 0000.

Make the madness stop. Insist on using 0000.

Step away from the computer, open a bottle of Maker's Mark, pour over ice, drink....repeat.

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Guest Cap-10
Why does DOD continue to insist on starting operations 1 minute after midnight? Everything thing I see is 0001. Do we magically skip a minute every night and I have been missing this al along? So I ask the question and these are the answers I received.

1. 0000 is not a valid time.

2. 2400 is midnight not 0000.

3. The computer does not understand 0000

4. 0000 confuses people.

Everyone, look at your digital watch. 1 second after 2359 and 59 seconds, the watch will read 0000 not 0001. Since we live in a post Y2K world, computers do understand 0000.

Make the madness stop. Insist on using 0000.

Nole, I think you may be confused when converting India time to Zulu.

Hoser

P.S. I agree with you, and good luck with the ORI

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Why does DOD continue to insist on starting operations 1 minute after midnight? Everything thing I see is 0001. Do we magically skip a minute every night and I have been missing this al along? So I ask the question and these are the answers I received.

1. 0000 is not a valid time.

2. 2400 is midnight not 0000.

3. The computer does not understand 0000

4. 0000 confuses people.

Probably number 4.

1-3 are BS and in all seriousness, it's probably very close to #4 - they're trying to prevent any confusion arising from issues like 1-3.

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If you want to see confused, put 0000 on a 781 and watch your 1COs.

I have, they look at it like a Hog looking at a wrist watch...

Then when you force them to put it in the system and they see it works, they look like a caveman seeing fire for the first time.

Edited by Nole_96
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Step away from the computer, open a bottle of Maker's Mark, pour over ice, drink....repeat.

I think you may have missed a step or two there:

"...repeat again...and when the commander asks if you're having any problems that would lead you to drinking, look him in the eye, say "zero, zero, zero...zero" and on the last "zero" take another drink"

Now, if you want to get creative/asinine/borderline insubordinate, take a picture of the clock in Base Ops one evening on Zulu time and note that it states "0000". Make sure to send it to EVERYONE. Perhaps build a powerpoint presentation. Write "MIDNIGHT IS 0000!" in shoe polish on the OSS/CC's car (he is, after all, the boss of these morons in Base Ops, right?)! Write it on your car. Write it on your commander's car. Make sure to use it as often as possible on forms including planning events to coincide with 0000...even if it means delaying takeoff by 30 minutes!!! Fight the good fight!

(Please realize you are correct and I agree with your position...but...)

...or you could take the time to read the governing regulation on the matter (ACP 121(H), Combined Communications-Electronics Board (April 2007) p. 24) and realize that the Joint Chiefs of Staff or equivalent in U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and U.K. agreed to NOT use 0000 because it could be confusing.

http://www.flt242.dk/Downloads/ACP121H.pdf

"327. Where practicable the time 2400 should be avoided unless it is necessary to indicate this particular instant of time; instead use 2359 or 0001. 0000 is not to be used unless it is accompanied by numbers to indicate a fraction of a minute past 2400, eg 0000.5 for ½ a minute past 2400. When extra digits are added to indicate fractions of a minute, special care must be taken to avoid any possibility of confusion with a date-time group."

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"327. Where practicable the time 2400 should be avoided unless it is necessary to indicate this particular instant of time; instead use 2359 or 0001. 0000 is not to be used unless it is accompanied by numbers to indicate a fraction of a minute past 2400, eg 0000.5 for ½ a minute past 2400. When extra digits are added to indicate fractions of a minute, special care must be taken to avoid any possibility of confusion with a date-time group."

ADDED: 327.1 If you can't figure out that the current day starts at 0000 without adding a minute, or fraction of a minute, you are a dumbass and should in no way be associated with any type of military operation that requires you to use, tell, or in a any other way interpret time.

I think I will just take CH’s advice!

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Guest CAVEMAN
Why does DOD continue to insist on starting operations 1 minute after midnight? Everything thing I see is 0001. Do we magically skip a minute every night and I have been missing this al along? So I ask the question and these are the answers I received.

1. 0000 is not a valid time.

2. 2400 is midnight not 0000.

3. The computer does not understand 0000

4. 0000 confuses people.

Everyone, look at your digital watch. 1 second after 2359 and 59 seconds, the watch will read 0000 not 0001. Since we live in a post Y2K world, computers do understand 0000.

Make the madness stop. Insist on using 0000.

#1: It is a valid time. 0000 or 2400hrs means the same. One is the start of the day and the other is the end of day.

#2: See #1

#3: Some old systems still do. Ask the Navy and Army. Don't always assume. I would imagine that this would change in the next few years especially with the GPS craze.

#4: Probably the Airforce and Army but definitely not the Navy. The 24hr clock have been used for centuries by astrologers. Since the Navy started navigatiing with celestial bodies, they most like understand this better.

Also read this:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/24-hour_clock or just go to the Naval Observatory webpage

Edited by CAVEMAN
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If you want to see confused, put 0000 on a 781 and watch your 1COs.

Or you could just round your times a little bit more (also to avoid the 0000 confusion lol) to give yourself an extra .1 hr of flight time--or am I the only one who does this?

I did hear an Army E-5 at Ali Asalem tell us about a role call at 2430--I just looked over at my buddy and he shook his head and said 'Yep, it's the Army'

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This actually reminds me of a college professor I had. He always made things due at 11:59 friday night (2359) and then added if it's a minute late no big deal. Apparently he used to say it's due at midnight friday but that drew to many questions of whether midnight was technically the start of the day (ie due thursday night/friday morning) or the end of the day (friday night / saturday morning).

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#1: It is a valid time. 0000 or 2400hrs means the same. One is the start of the day and the other is the end of day.

Wait...if it means the same, but 0000 is the START of a day and 2400 is the END of a day..does that mean that "Start" and "end" really mean the same thing, cause if that's the case, I am going to start rolling into work at the end of staff meetings, around lunch time, and I suppose I can just claim that the start is the same as the end so I had to be right...at least according to the Navy?

I guess I do agree that they mean the same point in time, but you gotta choose one!

Holy crap, I think I just added a reply to the dumbest thing I ever posted to.

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I think you may have missed a step or two there:

"...repeat again...and when the commander asks if you're having any problems that would lead you to drinking, look him in the eye, say "zero, zero, zero...zero" and on the last "zero" take another drink"

Now, if you want to get creative/asinine/borderline insubordinate, take a picture of the clock in Base Ops one evening on Zulu time and note that it states "0000". Make sure to send it to EVERYONE. Perhaps build a powerpoint presentation. Write "MIDNIGHT IS 0000!" in shoe polish on the OSS/CC's car (he is, after all, the boss of these morons in Base Ops, right?)! Write it on your car. Write it on your commander's car. Make sure to use it as often as possible on forms including planning events to coincide with 0000...even if it means delaying takeoff by 30 minutes!!! Fight the good fight!

(Please realize you are correct and I agree with your position...but...)

...or you could take the time to read the governing regulation on the matter (ACP 121(H), Combined Communications-Electronics Board (April 2007) p. 24) and realize that the Joint Chiefs of Staff or equivalent in U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and U.K. agreed to NOT use 0000 because it could be confusing.

http://www.flt242.dk/Downloads/ACP121H.pdf

"327. Where practicable the time 2400 should be avoided unless it is necessary to indicate this particular instant of time; instead use 2359 or 0001. 0000 is not to be used unless it is accompanied by numbers to indicate a fraction of a minute past 2400, eg 0000.5 for ½ a minute past 2400. When extra digits are added to indicate fractions of a minute, special care must be taken to avoid any possibility of confusion with a date-time group."

At first, I thought that you were full of shit. I'm not even going to ask how you found this...all I can say is that you need a hobby! When asked the question now, I can bust out "Oh, its in the ACP 121(H) pg 24. You fucking co-pilots don't know shit!"

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Oh, and just to add, I'm at Sather right now trying to get to Qatar on my last 4-day and when I stopped at the BX it said outside 'Closed from 2330 to 2430' for shift change or something.

You know, I always said I wish there was more time in a day to get my sh!t done, now it looks like they've given us an extra 30 minutes!

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At first, I thought that you were full of shit. I'm not even going to ask how you found this...all I can say is that you need a hobby! When asked the question now, I can bust out "Oh, its in the ACP 121(H) pg 24. You ######ing co-pilots don't know shit!"

Hell, typing it was the hard part. I typed in "military time" into Wikipedia and got this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_time

It had significant holes, so I went to the internal link to this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/24-hour_clock

It had a lot of info, but more importantly, in its references, it had "Communication instructions – General, Allied Communications Publication ACP 121(H), Combined Communications-Electronics Board, April 2007" as one of its sources. I clicked the hyperlink, but found the .pdf offline (temporarily? permanent?), so I did a google search for "ACP 121(H)". You have to be smart about searches. Realize they are looking for particular strings of text. If I'd put ACP 121(H) without the quotes, it would look for anything with 121, ACP, or H in it. By grouping them in that manner, it searches for only those in that particular order.

A simple Google search later (http://www.google.com/search?q=%22ACP+121(...lient=firefox-a) and I had the text of the document which showed not only the official military depiction for midnight, but the rationale behind it.

I cut & pasted it into my response. So, 2 searches and 4 clicks yielded the answer. For a former commo guy, that's nothing...

...you should see what I can do with Powerpoint... :-) :thumbsup:

Edited by BQZip01
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Guest Toner
I think you may have missed a step or two there:

"...repeat again...and when the commander asks if you're having any problems that would lead you to drinking, look him in the eye, say "zero, zero, zero...zero" and on the last "zero" take another drink"

Now, if you want to get creative/asinine/borderline insubordinate, take a picture of the clock in Base Ops one evening on Zulu time and note that it states "0000". Make sure to send it to EVERYONE. Perhaps build a powerpoint presentation. Write "MIDNIGHT IS 0000!" in shoe polish on the OSS/CC's car (he is, after all, the boss of these morons in Base Ops, right?)! Write it on your car. Write it on your commander's car. Make sure to use it as often as possible on forms including planning events to coincide with 0000...even if it means delaying takeoff by 30 minutes!!! Fight the good fight!

(Please realize you are correct and I agree with your position...but...)

...or you could take the time to read the governing regulation on the matter (ACP 121(H), Combined Communications-Electronics Board (April 2007) p. 24) and realize that the Joint Chiefs of Staff or equivalent in U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and U.K. agreed to NOT use 0000 because it could be confusing.

http://www.flt242.dk/Downloads/ACP121H.pdf

"327. Where practicable the time 2400 should be avoided unless it is necessary to indicate this particular instant of time; instead use 2359 or 0001. 0000 is not to be used unless it is accompanied by numbers to indicate a fraction of a minute past 2400, eg 0000.5 for ½ a minute past 2400. When extra digits are added to indicate fractions of a minute, special care must be taken to avoid any possibility of confusion with a date-time group."

So that's why I had to resubmit my leave request as 0001. Seems like they should have the default to a different time other than 0000 if that is not a valid time on Leaveweb.

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So that's why I had to resubmit my leave request as 0001. Seems like they should have the default to a different time other than 0000 if that is not a valid time on Leaveweb.

Sooooooo, the comm guys (J6/C6/A6) make the rules, but the minions under their control don't set up the equipment correctly?

<Sigh>

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