On Wed, Sep 27, 2006 at 03:26:59PM -0700, Mark Davis wrote:
As to UNTIL, it isn't just a confusion. The documentation says:
Input lines are made up of fields. Fields are separated from one another by any number of white space characters. Leading and trailing white space on input lines is ignored.
Thus saying that UNTIL is a single field with interior spaces contradicts this (and is also clumsier to parse and harder to explain).
It is still a matter of interpretation, ripe for confusion. The "classic" interpretation has been: *the* fields (e.g., the five or six in (Zone,NAME,GMTOFF,RULES/SAVE,FORMAT,[UNTIL])) are whitspace separated. The UNTIL field is *one* field, even if it does have spaces. The "wrong" interpretation you mention is a very reasonable reading, but not the one that was meant.
Could the explanation of transitions and the default for LETTER/S before the first year be added to zic.8.txt?
I'll take a stab at making zic.8 less ambiguous, if someone else doesn't beat me to it. --Ken Pizzini