How old is Seti?

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Nick - 31 May 2004 02:03 GMT

I know the 5th birthday was on 21st May this year, but I found this page:

http://setiathome2.ssl.berkeley.edu/classpages/days/2451239.html

which has people who registered on Monday March 1st 1999.

Any explanations?

Or are these people just the programmers who got themselves set up on SETI
before it officially started? Which doesn't seem right as there are other
people who have registered before the 21st May 1999, ie here

http://setiathome2.ssl.berkeley.edu/classpages/days/2451275.html on 6th
April

Oh, and can anyone explain the numbering system at the end of the web
address for registration classes? The 2451*** up to 2453***, as far as I can
tell, assuming that the date directly corresponds to the number, which it
does appear to, then "1" would have been about 6,770 years ago. I'd like to
know the significance of the starting date, if any.

Curiously,

Nick

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Bjorn Damm - 31 May 2004 07:36 GMT

> I know the 5th birthday was on 21st May this year, but I found this page:
>
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
>
> Any explanations?

When I found S@H in the summer 1998 they were alphatesting the software.
(Here is a screenshot from the 1998 version:
http://members.chello.se/bjornd/1998Screen.jpg )

In the fall 1998 the stoped distributing the software. Users from this early
period are registred as "1 March 1999". In spring 1999 there were quite a
lot of persons wating on their doorstep and they let a few in at the time
and the big crowd was let in on 21st May 1999.

> Or are these people just the programmers who got themselves set up on SETI
> before it officially started? Which doesn't seem right as there are other
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> does appear to, then "1" would have been about 6,770 years ago. I'd like to
> know the significance of the starting date, if any.

It is the "Julian day number", Number of days since 1 January, 4713 BC

/Björn

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Nick - 31 May 2004 12:00 GMT

> > I know the 5th birthday was on 21st May this year, but I found this page:
> >
[quoted text clipped - 12 lines]
> lot of persons wating on their doorstep and they let a few in at the time
> and the big crowd was let in on 21st May 1999.

So the big birthday isn't the real one... just the big one. Oh well, thanks
for the explanation.

> > Oh, and can anyone explain the numbering system at the end of the web
> > address for registration classes? The 2451*** up to 2453***, as far as I
[quoted text clipped - 7 lines]
>
> /Björn

Can't say I've ever heard of it. But ok. Excel does the same thing with
dates but counts from 1/1/1900, and anything earlier is a negative date
which just shows as #########.

Thanks for the explanations.

Nick

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Space Forum / SETI / May 2004

How old is Seti?