A Julian year is an interval with the length of a mean year in the Julian calend

ar, i.e. 365.25 days. This interval measure does not itself define any epoch: th
e Gregorian calendar is in general use for dating. But, standard conventional ep
ochs which are not Besselian epochs have been often designated nowadays with a p
refix "J", and the calendar date to which they refer is widely known, although n
ot always the same date in the year: thus "J2000" refers to the instant of 12h o
n 1 January 2000, and J1900 refers to the instant of 12h (midday) on 0 January 1
900, equal to 31 Dec 1899.[10] It is also usual now to specify on what time scal
e the time of day is expressed in that epoch-designation, e.g. often Terrestrial
Time.
In addition, an epoch optionally prefixed by "J" and designated as a year with d
ecimals (2000 +x), where x is positive or negative and quoted to 1 or 2 decimal
places, has come to mean a date that is an interval of x Julian years of 365.25
days away from the epoch J2000 = JD 2451545.0 (TT), still corresponding (in spit
e of the use of the prefix "J" or word "Julian") to the Gregorian calendar date
of 2000 Jan 1 at 12h TT (about 64 seconds before noon UTC on the same calendar d
ay).[9] (See also Julian year (astronomy).) Like the Besselian epoch, an arbitra
ry Julian epoch is therefore related to the Julian date by
J =
The
nox
0.0

2000.0 + (Julian date - 2451545.0)/365.25 .

IAU decided at their General Assembly of 1976[11] that the new standard equi
of J2000.0 should be used starting in 1984. Before that, the equinox of B195
seems to have been the standard.[citation needed]

Different astronomers or groups of astronomers used to define epochs to suit the

mselves, but nowadays standard epochs are generally defined by international agr
eement through the IAU, so astronomers worldwide can collaborate more effectivel
y. It is inefficient and error-prone if data or observations of one group have t
o be translated in non-standard ways so that other groups could compare the data
with information from other sources. An example of how this works: if a star's
position is measured by someone today, he/she then uses a standard transformatio
n to obtain the position expressed in terms of the standard reference frame of J
2000, and it is often then this J2000 position which is shared with others.