On Feb 3, 2011, at 10:54 AM, Paul Koning wrote:
The zone.tab file might seem like a starting point, but it isn't really; it just lists each of the zones with a single point in that zone. What you need is the analog of zone.tab but with the bounding polygon for each zone rather than a point inside it. I believe that data exists somewhere, but I don't remember the location.
The tz-link.htm file I mentioned in my previous message has a section "Time zone boundaries" that says: • TZ timezone maps contains a shapefile of the tz regions in the world. • Administrative Divisions of Countries ("Statoids") contains detailed lists of tz-related zone subdivision data. • Time zone boundaries for multizone countries summarizes legal boundaries between time zones within countries. • Manifold.net's Free Maps and GIS Data includes a Manifold-format map of world time zone boundaries distributed under the GPL. • The US Geological Survey's National Atlas of the United States publishes the Time Zones of the United States in the public domain. • The GeoCommunity lists several commercial sources for International Time Zones and Time Zone Data. • A ship within the territorial waters of any nation uses that nation's time. In international waters, time zone boundaries are meridians 15° apart, except that UTC−12 and UTC+12 are each 7.5° wide and are separated by the 180° meridian (not by the International Date Line, which is for land and territorial waters only). A captain can change ship's clocks any time after entering a new time zone; midnight changes are common. The links for those are: http://efele.net/maps/tz/ - the "TZ timezone maps" link (mentioned in another message); "shapefile" links to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shapefile, which describes what a shapefile is http://statoids.com/statoids.html - "Administrative Divisions of Countries ("Statoids") http://home.tiscali.nl/~t876506/Multizones.html - "Time zone boundaries for multizone countries" http://www.manifold.net/download/freemaps.html - "Manifold.net's Free Maps and GIS Data", but that link no longer works http://nationalatlas.gov/mld/timeznp.html - "Time Zones of the United States" http://spatialnews.geocomm.com/features/timezones/ - "The GeoCommunity lists several commercial sources for International Time Zones and Time Zone Data."