time_t just isn't big enough!

[infestedarch0n]

Situation:
My server uses redhat linux and time_t seems to only hold a number that reaches from 1970-2038. This could be a problem if I want to have people fill out any date that was before 1970. Actually it could be a crippling problem. All of the times in my script all use Unixtime and will thusly behave strangely when somebody makes a time before 1970. This brings me to the problem.

Problem:
All over my script I use this time format. Is there a way to modify time_t on my system (or host's system) to be a 32bit integer or modify it on PHP's settings it would possibly help me out so much. Or maybe a way to process the time myself.

Ultimate Question:
What would you do in this situation?

Thank you so much for your time.

Your fellow PHP programmer,
Mike Riehl

[marque]

Software programmers and computer builders must have some pre-occupation about the end of the world, IBM and Microsoft obviously thought it would be the 1st of Januarry 2000. Unix developers obviously believes it will be 2038.

The unix time stamp stores the amount of seconds since 00:00 1st Januarry 1970, so even if there were a way of increasing the number of digits from 14 to 255 still wouldn't fix the problem of not beaing able to select a date prior to 1970. Although theroecically there should be a default where you could set when time_t starts, doing this could have adverse affects on your system particulally if your server time runs of a time server.

My suggestion would simply be to store the time is this format
MMDDYYYYhhmmss or perhaps an ISO standard.