Perhaps lobby the House of Representatives to change the Bill to simply stop DST:

A) Its a more natural reflection of daylight and seasons. Its more in keeping with the age old tradition of keeping time by the Sun in the sky. Its better for the population's sleep patterns and so better for safety, health and productivity.

B) Its a simple matter for tzdb to accommodate that rule and for client systems to reflect it. There would be little or no technical disruption of civil time.

I want DST to go away, but I see "permanent DST" as an unnatural distortion and technically disruptive. Perhaps if lawmakers were made more aware if this there might be reconsideration of the terms of the Bill.

Thanks,
-Brooks


On 2022-03-16 12:45 AM, Chris Walton via tz wrote:

Regardless of what the legislation does or does not say, this database needs to quickly adopt a strategy to deal with changes that may be necessary for all North American Time zones.

The supporters and maintainers of this time zone database can take an active role in helping to define and endorse a common standard, or they can sit back and watch the politicians and the general public fumble the job.  It would be helpful if there was some collaboration between Microsoft and the supporters/maintainers of this database.

I think it is likely that if the US government approves the Sunshine Protection Act, that most Canadian provinces and territories will follow with similar legislation.

- British Columbia and Ontario already have the necessary legislation in place.
- Saskatchewan has not changed its clocks in many years.
- Yukon stopped changing its clocks in 2020.
- Alberta recently voted to keep the biannual change, it could be the lone holdout!
I admit I have not been following the other Canadian territories and provinces closely.

Also, I have no clue what Mexico, Saint Pierre & Miquelon, or any of the small island nations will decide to do.

For this database I can envision four options moving forward:

Option #1: ditch the three letter time zone strings and use only numerical offsets from UTC.
 This is a complete cop out that says "Let's abandon our end users and let somebody else deal with the issue".  It is my least favorite option.

  e.g. Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Vancouver:
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 -07 2024   (UTC-07)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 -07 2024   (UTC-07)
  e.g. New York and Toronto:
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 -04 2024   (UTC-04)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 -04 2024   (UTC-04)


Option #2: allow permanent daylight saving
This could be implemented without too many complications, but it goes against the philosophy that daylight saving is an alternate time offset that is only used for part of the year.

This is not my favorite option even though it is probably the least disruptive.  I do not think it will make any sense 20 years from now.
 e.g. Los Angeles, Phoenix, Vancouver, and Whitehorse would be on permanent Pacific Daylight Time
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 PDT 2024   (UTC-07)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 PDT 2024   (UTC-07)
 e.g. New York and Toronto would be on permanent Eastern Daylight Time:
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 EDT 2024   (UTC-04)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 EDT 2024   (UTC-04)


Option #3: move most North American entries in the TZ database one zone to the east:
I know we have done this in the past for places such as America/Whitehorse, but I expect if we did it for all of Canada and the US it would not align with the public's perception of reality.  Also, it provides no clear path to deal with any places that are currently using Atlantic Daylight Time (UTC-03).

 e.g. Los Angeles, Phoenix, Vancouver, and Whitehorse would be on permanent Mountain Standard Time
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 MST 2024   (UTC-07)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 MST 2024   (UTC-07)
 e.g. New York and Toronto would be on permanent Atlantic Standard Time:
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 AST 2024   (UTC-04)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 AST 2024   (UTC-04)


Option #4: redefine AKST, PST, MST, CST, EST, AST, and NST to all be one hour closer to UTC time.
 This is currently my preferred option even though it may break some software and it is guaranteed to conflict with the Canadian Interpretation Act.
 Alaska Standard Time      (AKST) is redefined to UTC-08.
 Pacific Standard Time      (PST) is redefined to UTC-07.
 Mountain Standard Time     (MST) is redefined to UTC-06.
 Central Standard Time      (CST) is redefined to UTC-05.
 Eastern Standard Time      (EST) is redefined to UTC-04.
 Atlantic Standard Time     (AST) is redefined to UTC-03.
 Newfoundland Standard Time (NST) is redefined to UTC-02:30 (assuming Newfoundland abandons the biannual time change)
  e.g. Los Angeles, Phoenix, Vancouver, and Whitehorse would be on Pacific Standard Time year-round:
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 PST 2024   (UTC-07)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 PST 2024   (UTC-07)
  e.g. New York and Toronto would be on Eastern Standard Time year-round:
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 EST 2024   (UTC-04)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 EST 2024   (UTC-04)
  e.g. Alberta would have to adopt new time zone names:  Pacific Standard Time in winter, and Pacific Daylight Time in summer. (Alberta recently voted to keep the biannual clock change).
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 PST 2024   (UTC-07)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 PDT 2024   (UTC-06)
  e.g. Saskatchewan would have to start referring to its time zone name as Mountain Standard Time instead of Central Standard Time. (Saskatchewan has used UTC-06 year-round for many years)
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 MST 2024   (UTC-06)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 MST 2024   (UTC-06)
  e.g. Puerto Rico would have to start referring to its time zone as Eastern Standard Time instead of Atlantic Standard Time.
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 EST 2024   (UTC-04)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 EST 2024   (UTC-04)
  e.g. If Atlantic Canada and Bermuda were to continue changing the clocks twice a year, they would be on Eastern Standard Time in winter and Eastern Daylight Time in summer.
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 EST 2024   (UTC-04)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 EDT 2024   (UTC-03)
 e.g. If,  Atlantic Canada and Bermuda were to abandon the time change, then they would both end up on Atlantic Standard Time year-round.
        Thu Feb  1 00:00:00 AST 2024   (UTC-03)
        Thu Aug  1 00:00:00 AST 2024   (UTC-03)

Did I miss anything?

-chris