Yes, I understand that may be what you think is acceptable, but it not what those that are mandated to debate such political and diplomatic items have already decided. I have no debate about what tz people use in Jerusalem. Its the same as what people use is Tel Aviv. The concern is whether Jerusalem is recognized as an Israeli city, and it should not be up to tz to make that decision. Without delegating responsibility for what country is a country, and which city is in a country, we leave the responsibility of making these political decisions squarely within the tz list maintainer's hands, and the responsibility of running counter to accepted political decisions within their hands. This clearly opens this list open to endless political debate - which should not be the case. But by agreeing to only follow the decisions of those whose job it is to make such political decisions, the political nature of the database is delegated, and cannot be driven by the whims of the maintainers or others on this list. My goal is to reduce the political debate on this list, and leave it to the diplomats and the standards committees that are under their control, to determine what is a country, and what city is in a country - then reflect those decisions in the database. On 2013-05-21 8:49, Kevin Lyda wrote:
On Tue, May 21, 2013 at 2:39 AM, David Patte ₯ <dpatte@relativedata.com> wrote:
So therefore, I would think that where possible its just simpler to follow recognize international standards (such as the UN) when improving the database. I generally agreed right up until there. tzinfo tries to reflect what people on the ground think. And I think country codes should reflect that.
Say that Floofy (fl) and Fnord (fn) claim ownership of the large city of Fubar. I don't see anything wrong with putting Fubar in fl and fn. This way people in Floofy and Fnord see the city they expect to be there. And at the end of the day that's what tzinfo is for.
In all the examples on the list there exist a large number of people who live in those places that operate under the belief that tzinfo reflects. They sign contracts, do banking, make appointments and generally live their lives in those timezones - even if they politically disagree with that belief.
Reflecting reality is not the same as reflecting bureaucracy. Reflecting reality is not the same as endorsing reality. Trying to twist the tzinfo db into a tool to change reality seems like an incredibly bad idea. It should reflect what's on the ground right now, not what we might want reality to be.
Kevin
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