Paul Eggert wrote:
Can someone confirm that zic is doing the right thing (which I kind of assume it is by definition), and perhaps give me a rule to follow when performing the %s substitutions?
It's doing what I wanted, anyway. Yep; zic is almost by definition 'right', just trying to understand it.
I think the general rule is that, before the first transition, you use the first standard-time abbreviation (not the first abbreviation, the first standard-time abbreviation).
If the zic documentation doesn't say this clearly enough for you, perhaps you could propose a patch? That would help others grok it.
Will do when I have it sorted out completely; but your answer was very helpful. Looking more closely at zic, it *seems* that the rule is: - expand all rules (one per year) - Use the prior rule text if there is one - if no prior rule text, use the latest rule text that has MAX in its 'to' field, zero offset, and which falls inside the range of dates of the zone line - if no such rule exists, use the first rule with 0 offset which is also in the range of dates allowed by the zone line Now my parser produces the same output as zdump, except for riyad87/88/89. which I am fixing; once that is done, I will send some patches. In terms of patches; should I send a patch for the man page? Or for the C file (or both, if I have time)?