Re:Why do arrays start at 0?
by lupire on Wednesday August 24, 2022 @03:40PM
(#32584697)
It's not "crazy". No one care about which century X00 is. The term "century" doesn't have enough sig figs. X00 is "the turn of the century".
[ Parent
| on HN ]
If you don't care then sure, it's not crazy, but if you did care then believe me, it is crazy. Crazy enough that astronomers[0] and software engineers[1] rebelled against the historian's practice and renamed the years preceding 1 AD in the proleptic gregorian calendar year 0, year -1, year -2, et cetera. A major benefit of this is it allows the leap year pattern to stay consistent and the rule to remain legibile for all years, going back before 1 AD. It's also nice because it lets us say "the 90's were the last ten years of the 20th century" and be correct.
0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomical_year_numbering
1. https://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/api/java/time/temporal...