Newsgroups: news.software.b
Path: utzoo!sq!msb
From: msb@sq.sq.com (Mark Brader)
Subject: Re: `GMT' -> `UT' in news header dates
Message-ID: <1991Mar28.021154.22991@sq.sq.com>
Organization: SoftQuad Inc., Toronto, Canada
References: <1991Mar25.211915.8268@watmath.waterloo.edu> <91Mar25.204233edt.1103@smoke.cs.toronto.edu> <1991Mar26.070301.13119@zoo.toronto.edu>
Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 02:11:54 GMT
Lines: 23

> > Don't you mean "UTC"?  I've never heard it called "UT".

> As I understand the situation, the *English* name is "Universal Time",
> but the *standard Latin-alphabet* abbreviation -- which isn't an acronym
> for anything in particular in any specific Latin-alphabet language -- is
> "UTC".  "UT" is improper ...

"UT" means Universal Time.  There are several flavors of this, their
definitions differing in details, but making no difference to the
everyday user.  These flavors are identified by what started life as
subscripts, and are now commonly written as following letters.
I know of three: "UT1", "UT2", and "UTC".  The C is for Coordinated;
"UTC" is formally "Coordinated Universal Time".

I thought I'd seen "UTC" written as "TUC" in French, but it is entirely
possible that "UTC", with the letters inline rather than the C as a
subscript, has been adopted as a standard at some... time.
-- 
Mark Brader			To err is human, but to really mess things up
SoftQuad Inc., Toronto		you need a timetable planner!
utzoo!sq!msb, msb@sq.com				-- Richard Porter

This article is in the public domain.
