Pondering 2038

There are plenty of uses for higher resolution timestamps; while microseconds is indeed an improvement, nanosecond resolution is better. Note that Java 1.8 will have nanosecond resolution time (in the java.time namespace), and having the system time and interfaces use equivalent or better time resolution would be desirable. (It would be derisable for all languages; Java is just the one I'm aware of moving to ns time from ms.)

Working with scientific/medical imaging, millisecond time resolution is common, but microsecond and nanosecond resolution are also used. One thing worth pointing out is that it doesn't matter that the CPU can't measure this accurately; external acquisition hardware can, and we want to be able to store and process such timing data. Being able to store the deltaT in between frames at a higher precision removes one source of variability due to decreased error. And this applies to timings from anything external to the CPU. Even on the CPU, the increased precision is useful, even if it isn't as accurate as we might like.

Regards,
Roger