August 2005 - tz - lists.iana.org

proposed tz change for Latvia, Lithuania
by Paul Eggert 25 May '15

25 May '15

It's March Madness time for daylight-saving rule changes. Here's a proposed change to the tz database to keep up with the latest political development, which affects time stamps starting March 29: * Latvia and Lithuania will not observe DST, starting this year. Thanks to Andrei Ivanov for this info. =================================================================== RCS file: RCS/europe,v retrieving revision 2000.3 retrieving revision 2000.3.0.1 diff -pu -r2000.3 -r2000.3.0.1 --- europe 2000/03/04 15:31:08 2000.3 +++ europe 2000/03/08 17:48:59 2000.3.0.1 @@ -1135,6 +1135,12 @@ Link Europe/Rome Europe/San_Marino # 1997-01-21 on transition to Summer time ... established the same order of # daylight savings time settings as in the States of the European Union. +# From Andrei Ivanov (2000-03-06): +# This year Latvia will not switch to Daylight Savings Time (as specified in +# <a href="http://www.lv-laiks.lv/wwwraksti/2000/071072/vd4.htm"> +# The Regulations of the Cabinet of Ministers of the Rep. of Latvia of +# 29-Feb-2000 (#79)</a>, in Latvian for subscribers only). + # Rule NAME FROM TO TYPE IN ON AT SAVE LETTER/S Rule Latvia 1989 1996 - Mar lastSun 2:00s 1:00 S Rule Latvia 1989 1996 - Sep lastSun 2:00s 0 - @@ -1151,7 +1157,8 @@ Zone Europe/Riga 1:36:24 - LMT 1880 3:00 Russia MSK/MSD 1989 Mar lastSun 2:00s 2:00 1:00 EEST 1989 Sep lastSun 2:00s 2:00 Latvia EE%sT 1997 Jan 21 - 2:00 EU EE%sT + 2:00 EU EE%sT 2000 Feb 29 + 2:00 - EET # Liechtenstein # Zone NAME GMTOFF RULES FORMAT [UNTIL] @@ -1178,6 +1185,11 @@ Zone Europe/Vaduz 0:38:04 - LMT 1894 Jun # motion to give up shifting to summer time in spring, as it was # already done by Estonia. +# From Andrei Ivanov (2000-03-06): +# I've heard that Ministers of three Baltic countries on their summit +# somewhere in February decided not to switch to summer time starting from +# this spring. + # Zone NAME GMTOFF RULES FORMAT [UNTIL] Zone Europe/Vilnius 1:41:16 - LMT 1880 1:24:00 - WMT 1917 # Warsaw Mean Time @@ -1192,7 +1204,8 @@ Zone Europe/Vilnius 1:41:16 - LMT 1880 2:00 C-Eur EE%sT 1998 2:00 - EET 1998 Mar 29 1:00u 1:00 EU CE%sT 1999 Oct 31 1:00u - 2:00 EU EE%sT + 2:00 EU EE%sT 2000 Feb + 2:00 - EET # Luxembourg # Whitman disagrees with most of these dates in minor ways; go with Shanks.

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Australia - Broken Hill - Yancowinna
by Oscar van Vlijmen 15 Dec '06

15 Dec '06

Broken Hill, or more precise, the whole county of Yancowinna, differs from the rest of New South Wales, as clearly stated in the TZ database. Problem is: what is the "county of Yancowinna"? The Australian Standard Time Act 1987 mentions this county, but doesn't mention the county boundaries. Once they were known, but they have disappeared from recent maps. Finally I found a scan of an old map from the Land Registry, showing the Yancowinna county. Found on the website of The Sydney Morning Herald: <http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/08/29/1062050651816.html?oneclick=true> Click on field number 2 or download the map directly: <http://www.smh.com.au/specials/leases/pdf/map2.pdf> The following places are within the county boundaries: Broken Hill, The Gorge, Mount Gipps, Silverton, Stephens Creek, Wahratta, Yanco Glen. The name "Wahratta" is not perfectly readable from the map, but I've checked the name and location against the Australia file from the GEOnet Names Server <http://earth-info.nga.mil/gns/> Oscar van Vlijmen 2005-04-23

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More Indiana counties weigh in; some start fighting with each other
by Paul Eggert 29 Aug '05

29 Aug '05

Elkhart county may ask the federal government to overturn St. Joseph county's decision to switch to central time. St. Joseph (home of South Bend) is the state's 4th-largest county. Elkhart argues that it would be hard for St. Joseph to prove that South Bend is part of the greater Chicago area economically. <http://www.etruth.com/News/Content.aspx?ID=355286> <http://www.wndu.com/news/082005/news_44369.php> <http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/fortwayne/news/local/12493393.htm> Kosciusko County originally pledged to join St. Joseph County in a quest for Central Time, but on Tuesday decided to stay "neutral" instead. But there is no "neutral"; if they do nothing, they'll stay on eastern time. <http://www.wndu.com/news/082005/news_44313.php> Marshall County is petitioning for central time. <http://www.wndu.com/news/082005/news_44306.php>

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Bubba Lewis says Phenix City, Alabama, observes eastern time
by Paul Eggert 29 Aug '05

29 Aug '05

According to Friday's Huntsville Times <http://www.al.com/news/huntsvilletimes/index.ssf?/base/news/112504778322832…> a few towns on Alabama's "eastern border with Georgia, such as Phenix City in Russell County, Lanett in Chambers County and some towns in Lee County, set their watches and clocks on Eastern time." The Times quotes H.H. "Bubba" Roberts, city administrator in Phenix City. as saying "We are in the Central time zone, but we do go by the Eastern time zone because so many people work in Columbus." We don't have any history of these changes, so for now I'm inclined to ask people in that area to use America/New_York. But I'll put a comment into the northamerica file.

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Tzcode2005m.tar.gz and tzdata2005m.tar.gz
by Olson, Arthur David (NIH/NCI) 29 Aug '05

29 Aug '05

The files... ftp://elsie.nci.nih.gov/pub/tzcode2005m.tar.gz ...and... ftp://elsie.nci.nih.gov/pub/tzdata2005m.tar.gz ...are now available. These reflect the changes circulated last week on the time zone mailing list by Paul Eggert (with a small tweak to the tz-art change); in addition, a declaration of an unused variable has been removed from zdump.c --ado

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Tzcode2005l.tar.gz and tzdata2005l.tar.gz
by Olson, Arthur David (NIH/NCI) 23 Aug '05

23 Aug '05

The files... ftp://elsie.nci.nih.gov/pub/tzcode2005l.tar.gz ...and... ftp://elsie.nci.nih.gov/pub/tzdata2005l.tar.gz ...are now available. These incorporate the changes circulated last week on the time zone mailing list by Paul Eggert, plus the overflow/underflow checks circulated by yours truly, minus changes to the "Theory" file about the pending addition of 64-bit data (I grow less confident of the changes being accepted with each passing day, and the changes no longer increase the data files nine-fold--there's less than a doubling in size by my local Sun's reckoning). --ado

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proposed tz followup changes for Indiana, Japan, etc.
by Paul Eggert 23 Aug '05

23 Aug '05

> Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2005 10:49:55 -0700 > From: Eric Fischer <enf(a)pobox.com> > In the "northamerica" file, I think the > > Link America/Indianapolis EST > > line needs to be > > Link America/Indiana/Indianapolis EST Thanks for pointing out the problem, but that points out a more serious problem: starting next year, Indianapolis will observe daylight-saving time, so linking it to "EST" will no longer be appropriate. Here is a proposed patch to fix this problem, along with some other Indiana-related issues. Also, I found an article detailing Japan's daylight-saving time during the occupation, and decided that most of the country was really observing DST, so we need to update our tables. And there were a couple other minor changes in recent discussion. Changes affecting current and future time stamps. * Since Indianapolis will start observing DST next year, "Link America/Indianaopolis EST" is no longer appropriate. Link from America/Panama instead. (Thanks to Eric Fischer for pointing out the problem.) Changes affecting historical time stamps. * Japan observed DST from 1948 through 1951. I knew about this already, but did not realize how much affected daily life until I read an article in the 2005-08-10 Japan Times. (Thanks to Mayumi Negishi for writing that article.) Organizational changes * Move the following entries from "northamerica" to "backward", since they are present only for backward compatibility: EST5EDT CST6CDT MST7MDT PST8PDT EST MST HST * Sort the entries in "backward". Commentary changes * Update "Theory" to mention that uninhabited countries do not need Zone entries. (Thanks to Mark Davis for spotting this.) * Mention JDT and KDT in the commentary about abbreviations. * Mention that "US" rules are used only in the United States. (Thanks to Arthur David Olson for this.) * Update Indiana commentary to match current situation. Web page changes * Update Indiana-related commentary. Fix typo: Starke County is in Indiana, not Kentucky. * Update obsolete URL in tz-art.htm. (Thanks to Frank Vance for this.) =================================================================== RCS file: RCS/Theory,v retrieving revision 2005.12 retrieving revision 2005.12.0.1 diff -pu -r2005.12 -r2005.12.0.1 --- Theory 2005/08/22 16:06:13 2005.12 +++ Theory 2005/08/23 04:28:37 2005.12.0.1 @@ -242,6 +242,8 @@ in decreasing order of importance: Include at least one location per time zone rule set per country. One such location is enough. Use ISO 3166 (see the file iso3166.tab) to help decide whether something is a country. + However, uninhabited ISO 3166 regions like Bouvet Island + do not need locations, since local time is not defined there. If all the clocks in a country's region have agreed since 1970, don't bother to include more than one location even if subregions' clocks disagreed before 1970. =================================================================== RCS file: RCS/asia,v retrieving revision 2005.12 retrieving revision 2005.12.0.1 diff -pu -r2005.12 -r2005.12.0.1 --- asia 2005/08/22 16:05:26 2005.12 +++ asia 2005/08/23 06:14:43 2005.12.0.1 @@ -43,8 +43,8 @@ # 8:00 CST China # 9:00 CJT Central Japanese Time (1896/1937)* # 9:00 EIT east Indonesia -# 9:00 JST Japan -# 9:00 KST Korea +# 9:00 JST JDT Japan +# 9:00 KST KDT Korea # 9:30 CST (Australian) Central Standard Time # # See the `europe' file for Russia and Turkey in Asia. @@ -846,14 +846,28 @@ Zone Asia/Jerusalem 2:20:56 - LMT 1880 # Today's _Asahi Evening News_ (page 4) reports that Japan had # daylight saving between 1948 and 1951, but ``the system was discontinued # because the public believed it would lead to longer working hours.'' + +# From Mayumi Negishi in the 2005-08-10 Japan Times +# <http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20050810f2.htm>: +# Occupation authorities imposed daylight-saving time on Japan on +# [1948-05-01].... But lack of prior debate and the execution of +# daylight-saving time just three days after the bill was passed generated +# deep hatred of the concept.... The Diet unceremoniously passed a bill to +# dump the unpopular system in October 1951, less than a month after the San +# Francisco Peace Treaty was signed. (A government poll in 1951 showed 53% +# of the Japanese wanted to scrap daylight-saving time, as opposed to 30% who +# wanted to keep it.) + # Shanks writes that daylight saving in Japan during those years was as follows: # Rule NAME FROM TO TYPE IN ON AT SAVE LETTER/S -#Rule Japan 1948 only - May Sun>=1 2:00 1:00 D -#Rule Japan 1948 1951 - Sep Sat>=8 2:00 0 S -#Rule Japan 1949 only - Apr Sun>=1 2:00 1:00 D -#Rule Japan 1950 1951 - May Sun>=1 2:00 1:00 D -# but the only locations using it were US military bases. -# We go with Shanks and omit daylight saving in those years for Asia/Tokyo. +Rule Japan 1948 only - May Sun>=1 2:00 1:00 D +Rule Japan 1948 1951 - Sep Sat>=8 2:00 0 S +Rule Japan 1949 only - Apr Sun>=1 2:00 1:00 D +Rule Japan 1950 1951 - May Sun>=1 2:00 1:00 D +# but the only locations using it (for birth certificates, presumably, since +# Shanks's audience is astrologers) were US military bases. For now, assume +# that for most purposes daylight-saving time was observed; otherwise, what +# would have been the point of the 1951 poll? # From Hideyuki Suzuki (1998-11-09): # 'Tokyo' usually stands for the former location of Tokyo Astronomical @@ -883,7 +897,7 @@ Zone Asia/Jerusalem 2:20:56 - LMT 1880 Zone Asia/Tokyo 9:18:59 - LMT 1887 Dec 31 15:00u 9:00 - JST 1896 9:00 - CJT 1938 - 9:00 - JST + 9:00 Japan J%sT # Since 1938, all Japanese possessions have been like Asia/Tokyo. # Jordan =================================================================== RCS file: RCS/northamerica,v retrieving revision 2005.12 retrieving revision 2005.12.0.2 diff -pu -r2005.12 -r2005.12.0.2 --- northamerica 2005/08/22 16:05:26 2005.12 +++ northamerica 2005/08/23 06:14:43 2005.12.0.2 @@ -110,6 +110,12 @@ # # He had scored a 20-second scoop on other broadcasters. +# From Arthur David Olson (2005-08-22): +# Paul has been careful to use the "US" rules only in those locations +# that are part of the United States; this reflects the real scope of +# U.S. government action. So even though the "US" rules have changed +# in the latest release, other countries won't be affected. + # Rule NAME FROM TO TYPE IN ON AT SAVE LETTER/S Rule US 1918 1919 - Mar lastSun 2:00 1:00 D Rule US 1918 1919 - Oct lastSun 2:00 0 S @@ -225,8 +231,8 @@ Rule US 2007 max - Nov Sun>=1 2:00 0 S # US eastern time, represented by New York # Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, most of Florida, -# Georgia, southeast Indiana (Clark, Dearborn, Floyd, Harrison, and -# Ohio counties), eastern Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, +# Georgia, southeast Indiana (Dearborn and Ohio counties), eastern Kentucky +# (except America/Kentucky/Louisville below), Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, # New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, # Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, eastern Tennessee, # Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia @@ -481,27 +487,30 @@ Zone America/Boise -7:44:49 - LMT 1883 N # For a map of Indiana's time zone regions, see: # <a href="http://www.mccsc.edu/time.html"> # What time is it in Indiana? -# </a> (1999-04-06) +# </a> (2005-05-03) +# +# From Paul Eggert (2005-08-22): +# Since 1970, most of Indiana has been like America/Indiana/Indianapolis, +# with the following exceptions: +# +# - Gibson, Jasper, Lake, LaPorte, Newton, Porter, Posey, Spencer, +# Vandenburgh, and Warrick counties have been like America/Chicago. +# +# - Dearborn and Ohio counties have been like America/New_York. +# +# - Clark, Floyd, and Harrison counties have been like +# America/Kentucky/Louisville. +# +# - Crawford, Starke, and Switzerland counties have their own time zone +# histories as noted below. # -# From Paul Eggert (1995-12-19): -# Indiana generally observes either EST all year, or CST/CDT, -# but areas near Cincinnati and Louisville use those cities' timekeeping -# and in 1969 and 1970 the whole state observed daylight time; -# and there are other exceptions as noted below. # Shanks partitions Indiana into 345 regions, each with its own time history, # and writes ``Even newspaper reports present contradictory information.'' # Fortunately, most of the complexity occurred before our cutoff date of 1970. # -# Since 1970, EST-only Indiana has been like America/Indianapolis, -# with exceptions noted below for Crawford, Starke, and Switzerland counties. -# The parts of Indiana not listed below have been like America/Chicago, -# America/Louisville, or America/New_York. -# # Other than Indianapolis, the Indiana place names are so nondescript # that they would be ambiguous if we left them at the `America' level. # So we reluctantly put them all in a subdirectory `America/Indiana'. -# -# Most of EST-only Indiana last observed DST in 1970. # From Paul Eggert (2005-08-16): # http://www.mccsc.edu/time.html says that Indiana will use DST starting 2006, @@ -575,7 +584,7 @@ Zone America/Indiana/Vevay -5:40:16 - LM -5:00 US E%sT # Part of Kentucky left its clocks alone in 1974. -# This also includes a part of Indiana immediately adjacent to Louisville. +# This also includes Clark, Floyd, and Harrison counties in Indiana. # Rule NAME FROM TO TYPE IN ON AT SAVE LETTER Rule Louisville 1921 only - May 1 2:00 1:00 D Rule Louisville 1921 only - Sep 1 2:00 0 S @@ -716,17 +725,6 @@ Zone America/Menominee -5:50:27 - LMT 18 # _Los Angeles Times_ (1998-11-10), A1, A10; it cites # Jimmy Skaggs, _The Great Guano Rush_ (1994). -# Old names, for S5 users - -# Link LINK-FROM LINK-TO -Link America/New_York EST5EDT -Link America/Chicago CST6CDT -Link America/Denver MST7MDT -Link America/Los_Angeles PST8PDT -Link America/Indianapolis EST -Link America/Phoenix MST -Link Pacific/Honolulu HST - ################################################################################ =================================================================== RCS file: RCS/backward,v retrieving revision 2005.12 retrieving revision 2005.12.0.1 diff -pu -r2005.12 -r2005.12.0.1 --- backward 2005/08/22 16:05:26 2005.12 +++ backward 2005/08/23 04:28:37 2005.12.0.1 @@ -4,8 +4,8 @@ # and their old names. Many names changed in late 1993. Link Africa/Bamako Africa/Timbuktu -Link America/Adak America/Atka Link America/Argentina/Catamarca America/Argentina/ComodRivadavia +Link America/Adak America/Atka Link America/Argentina/Buenos_Aires America/Buenos_Aires Link America/Argentina/Catamarca America/Catamarca Link America/Argentina/Cordoba America/Cordoba @@ -23,9 +23,9 @@ Link Asia/Ashgabat Asia/Ashkhabad Link Asia/Chongqing Asia/Chungking Link Asia/Dhaka Asia/Dacca Link Asia/Macau Asia/Macao -Link Asia/Makassar Asia/Ujung_Pandang Link Asia/Jerusalem Asia/Tel_Aviv Link Asia/Thimphu Asia/Thimbu +Link Asia/Makassar Asia/Ujung_Pandang Link Asia/Ulaanbaatar Asia/Ulan_Bator Link Australia/Sydney Australia/ACT Link Australia/Sydney Australia/Canberra @@ -42,6 +42,7 @@ Link America/Rio_Branco Brazil/Acre Link America/Noronha Brazil/DeNoronha Link America/Sao_Paulo Brazil/East Link America/Manaus Brazil/West +Link America/Chicago CST6CDT Link America/Halifax Canada/Atlantic Link America/Winnipeg Canada/Central Link America/Regina Canada/East-Saskatchewan @@ -54,6 +55,8 @@ Link America/Whitehorse Canada/Yukon Link America/Santiago Chile/Continental Link Pacific/Easter Chile/EasterIsland Link America/Havana Cuba +Link America/Panama EST +Link America/New_York EST5EDT Link Africa/Cairo Egypt Link Europe/Dublin Eire Link Europe/London Europe/Belfast @@ -64,6 +67,7 @@ Link Etc/GMT GMT+0 Link Etc/GMT GMT-0 Link Etc/GMT GMT0 Link Etc/GMT Greenwich +Link Pacific/Honolulu HST Link Asia/Hong_Kong Hongkong Link Atlantic/Reykjavik Iceland Link Asia/Tehran Iran @@ -72,17 +76,20 @@ Link America/Jamaica Jamaica Link Asia/Tokyo Japan Link Pacific/Kwajalein Kwajalein Link Africa/Tripoli Libya +Link America/Phoenix MST +Link America/Denver MST7MDT Link America/Tijuana Mexico/BajaNorte Link America/Mazatlan Mexico/BajaSur Link America/Mexico_City Mexico/General -Link America/Denver Navajo Link Pacific/Auckland NZ Link Pacific/Chatham NZ-CHAT +Link America/Denver Navajo +Link Asia/Shanghai PRC +Link America/Los_Angeles PST8PDT Link Pacific/Pago_Pago Pacific/Samoa Link Pacific/Truk Pacific/Yap Link Europe/Warsaw Poland Link Europe/Lisbon Portugal -Link Asia/Shanghai PRC Link Asia/Taipei ROC Link Asia/Seoul ROK Link Asia/Singapore Singapore @@ -92,7 +99,7 @@ Link America/Anchorage US/Alaska Link America/Adak US/Aleutian Link America/Phoenix US/Arizona Link America/Chicago US/Central -Link America/Indianapolis US/East-Indiana +Link America/Indiana/Indianapolis US/East-Indiana Link America/New_York US/Eastern Link Pacific/Honolulu US/Hawaii Link America/Indiana/Knox US/Indiana-Starke =================================================================== RCS file: RCS/tz-link.htm,v retrieving revision 2005.12 retrieving revision 2005.12.0.1 diff -pu -r2005.12 -r2005.12.0.1 --- tz-link.htm 2005/08/22 16:05:26 2005.12 +++ tz-link.htm 2005/08/23 06:14:43 2005.12.0.1 @@ -62,13 +62,13 @@ Locations are identified by continent or the location, which is typically the largest city within the region. For example, <code>America/New_York</code> represents most of the <abbr title="United States">US</abbr> eastern time zone; -<code>America/Indianapolis</code> represents most of Indiana, which -uses eastern time without daylight saving time (<abbr +<code>America/Phoenix</code> represents most of Arizona, which +uses mountain time without daylight saving time (<abbr title="daylight saving time">DST</abbr>); <code>America/Detroit</code> represents most of Michigan, which uses eastern time but with different <abbr>DST</abbr> rules in 1975; and other entries represent smaller regions like Starke County, -Kentucky, which switched from central to eastern time in 1991. +Indiana, which switched from central to eastern time in 1991. To use the database on an extended <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/POSIX"><abbr title="Portable Operating System Interface">POSIX</abbr></a> =================================================================== RCS file: RCS/tz-art.htm,v retrieving revision 2005.10 retrieving revision 2005.10.0.1 diff -pu -r2005.10 -r2005.10.0.1 --- tz-art.htm 2005/07/14 18:13:40 2005.10 +++ tz-art.htm 2005/08/23 06:14:43 2005.10.0.1 @@ -177,7 +177,7 @@ An on-line English-language translation <tr><td>Film</td><td>Bell Science - About Time</td></tr> <tr><td>Notes</td><td>The Frank Baxter/Richard Deacon extravaganza Information on ordering is available at -<a href="http://www.videoflicks.com/VF2/1035/1035893.ihtml">http://www.videoflicks.com/VF2/1035/1035893.ihtml</a></td></tr> +<a href="http://www.videoflicks.com/titles/1035/1035893.htm">http://www.videoflicks.com/titles/1035/1035893.htm</a></td></tr> </table> <hr /> <ul>

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RE: How will the US daylight-saving change affect Canada, Mexico, etc.?
by Olson, Arthur David (NIH/NCI) 22 Aug '05

22 Aug '05

It's worth noting that in the time zone data files Paul has been careful to use the "US" rules only in those locations that are part of the United States; this reflects the real scope of U. S. government action. So even though the "US" rules have changed in the latest release, other countries won't be affected. Everyone gets to be on the watch for changes in U. S. neighbors. --ado

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Indiana counties start to make their time zone preferences known
by Paul Eggert 18 Aug '05

18 Aug '05

Indiana counties wanting to change their time zones have until Sept. 16 to ask the US Dept. of Transportation to hold hearings to switch time zones. I thought I'd look to see which way their leaning. Early returns suggest a preference for Eastern time, as one might expect. None of these results are official yet, so this won't yet affect the tz data, but: Allen County residents prefer Eastern, 65%-35%. <http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/fortwayne/news/local/12413842.htm> Wabash Valley viewers prefer Eastern to Central Time, 58%-42%. <http://www.wthitv.com/newsdet.asp?id=9444> Perry County's commissioners opt for Central time, but Dubios County looks like it may stick with Eastern time. <http://www.perrycountynews.com/articles/2005/08/18/top_story/t1.txt> And, my personal favorite: Bartholomew County's commissioners have decided that it will join whatever time zone its northern neighbor Marion County chooses, regardless of public opinion. <http://www.wabashplaindealer.com/articles/2005/08/16/state_news/state3.txt>

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Re: Request from CLDR committee
by Paul Eggert 18 Aug '05

18 Aug '05

"Mark Davis" <mark.davis(a)icu-project.org> writes: > I agree that these are oddities, and that ISO really shouldn't have > had country codes for them. Unfortunately, these are more than > glitches; many systems use ISO codes internally. And completeness > helps in testing, even if these are uninhabited. It depends on what sort of "completeness" you want. To my mind, a system that can adequately represent absent or missing data is more complete than a system that cannot. > I don't see anything wrong with setting them to be the time that > would otherwise be the case, using the maritime zones. > If you don't change them, you really have to change Theory to be > accurate. It says now: > > " Include at least one location per time zone rule set per country. > One such location is enough. Use ISO 3166 (see the file > iso3166.tab) to help decide whether something is a country. > " > to something like: > > " For most countries, include at least one location per time > zone rule set per country. > One such location is enough. Use ISO 3166 (see the file > iso3166.tab) to help decide whether something is a country. > " Yes, that's true. Thanks. I'll insert the word "inhabited" before "country"; that's simpler. > The x/x/x... notation is fine for internal use, but isn't really the > best for end users. The x/x/x notation is intended only for "internal" use, if by "internal" you mean "visible to programmers and people who know how to use the shell and such-like". I don't see why end users would ever need to see it. And if end users do need to see it, I don't see why they would care whether there are slashes in it. > If we can't depend on the TZ group to assign unique final fields, we > can prepare to have deviations from them wherever > necessary. If slashes are causing problems for you, you can replace them with some other character, e.g., colons. > However, we really would like to avoid that. With all the > possible names, and with exceptions such as Bahia already in the > database, it is unclear why non-unique final fields have to be used: > perhaps you can take a few minutes to explain why that is required? It's meant as a convenience to programmers and people who know how to use the shell and such-like. It's better to use mnemonics. > I had thought that all the rules for *all* the timezones, > Etc/GMT+-X, America/Los_Angeles, etc. were defined in terms of > offsets from UTC. If some of them are not, that is very unclear from > the documentation. Can you explain which are and which aren't? They are not merely history of offsets from UTC. They also are histories of whether the time in question is daylight saving time (the tm_isdst flag of C; see <http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/basedefs/time.h.html>), and the time zone abbreviation in effect (the tzname of POSIX; see <http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/functions/tzname.html>). So, even if the UTC offset histories are identical, the other bits of information may mean that the Zone entries still differ. >> How about if you simplify your life by simply ignoring the Etc/* names? > > But those are used for maritime rules, right? Not in POSIX, no. You can just use something like TZ='<GMT+12>-12'. > We also need them for cases where parsing a zone gives no other > information. If we parse a string like "12:00am GMT-500", we cannot > assign it to a zone with a location, since we don't know which one > it would be. But in that case you need approximately 24*60 entries, right? That sounds excessive. >>> AQ Antarctica/Mawson >>> AQ Antarctica/Vostok -- same since 57 >> >> As far as I know it's merely a coincidence that the two bases use the >> same time zone. Most crucially the bases belong to different >> countries (so to some extent the "different country" rule applies, >> though admittedly Antarctica is special) and use different supply >> lines. I'd rather leave them alone for now. > > Then you need additional clarification in Theory, that not only do you > subtract country codes from ISO, you add them as well ;-) They do use different tz abbreviations (tzname), if that's what we need for an excuse. >>> List C. TZIDs that are linked, but refer to different locations. >> >> As a rule, these locations have identical time zone histories except >> before the advent of standard time; and LMT (by definition) is >> approximate, so I don't see the harm in keeping them linked. >> If they are trouble for your system, perhaps you can keep a >> list of exceptions and filter them out. > > We do, but that means that we have to check for "faux" links with > every version of the TZ database. If at least you put put them in a > special file that we could mechanically check for, or had some kind of > extra notation, even a comment that we could parse for (documented in > Theory), then we wouldn't have to hack around it. How about if you just ignore all the "Link" entries? Or, if that's not quite right, include the exceptional entries that need to be added.

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