Olson, Arthur David (NIH/NCI) [E] wrote:

...

Why is there a rule for Oct 2008* if there is nothing officially known?

The rule reflects the sense that Argentina is likelier than not to observe DST, even though nothing is officially known. As indicated in the proposed change letter, there'll be a further update if Argentina does something different than what's now in the Rules.

So basically the current tzdata has a *guess* at when it *might* be. As you probably know, many operating systems had their time wrong last week because tzdata said DST would start on the 5th. Ubuntu took days to update the tzdata since the report. The current package says it will start on the 19th. If the government doesn't say *anything* about DST, what will you do? Change the rules on the 18th to remove the DST? Do you know how much time it will take for all distros to have it? Definitely more than a day, so on the 19th we'll have the same mess again.

<derick <at> php.net> writes:

On Wed, 8 Oct 2008, Nicolas Alvarez wrote:

...

Olson, Arthur David (NIH/NCI) [E] wrote:

...

...

Why is there a rule for Oct 2008* if there is nothing officially known?

The rule reflects the sense that Argentina is likelier than not to

observe

...

...

DST, even though nothing is officially known. As indicated in the proposed change letter, there'll be a further update if Argentina does something different than what's now in the Rules.

So basically the current tzdata has a *guess* at when it *might* be.

As you probably know, many operating systems had their time wrong last week because tzdata said DST would start on the 5th. Ubuntu took days to update the tzdata since the report. The current package says it will start on the 19th.

If the government doesn't say *anything* about DST, what will you do? Change the rules on the 18th to remove the DST? Do you know how much time it will take for all distros to have it? Definitely more than a day, so on the 19th we'll have the same mess again.

I would have to agree with that - it would be better *not* to have the rule for switching to DST in 2008 in there at all to prevent confusion when people update to the new 2008h and their clocks switch incorrectly on the 19th.

regards, Derick

I strongly agree with Nicolas, the event last week was caused by a previous *guess* as you can see here (http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.time.tz/2015) and has been causing several problems in our systems these days. Our government hasn't released any new law describing DST for this year so there isn's any reason to include 2008 (and future) Rules for Argentina. In my case i haven't included the '08s Rule in my tzdata last year, but i'm using some JAVA software that has included it in their tzupdater tool. Now i have to wait for a fixed tzdata and then wait for SUN to release the tzupdater tool including that tzdata. Please do not make the same mistake twice, the rules should be based on laws or formal government announcements. Thanks ezequiel

http://www.australia.gov.au/Time -----Original Message----- From: Vilas Khare (vkhare) [mailto:vkhare@cisco.com] Sent: Thursday, 9 October 2008 1:00 PM To: tz@lecserver.nci.nih.gov Subject: Official site for Australia Timezones Hello, What is the official site for Australian time zone and recent DST changes ? Vilas --

Thank you Eric. How does one keep informed about upcoming time zone and DST/STD rule changes for various countries ? We have a in-house application that needs to convert local time to/from UTC for users around the globe and thus need to keep track of when DST begins/ends for each time zone. We use ISO std. time zone conventions (ex. America/Los_Angeles, Australia/Melbourne etc). Vilas -- -----Original Message----- From: Eric Ulevik [mailto:eulevik@gmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, October 08, 2008 7:12 PM To: tz@lecserver.nci.nih.gov Cc: tz@lecserver.nci.nih.gov Subject: Re: Official site for Australia Timezones On Thu, Oct 9, 2008 at 2:00 PM, Vilas Khare (vkhare) <vkhare@cisco.com> wrote:

What is the official site for Australian time zone and recent DST changes ?

There isn't a single official site. Each state legislates time separately. I sent links with the legislation covering the recent change to this mailing list: http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.time.tz/1897/ Regards, Eric Ulevik

On Oct 8, 2008, at 7:31 PM, Vilas Khare (vkhare) wrote:

How does one keep informed about upcoming time zone and DST/STD rule changes for various countries ? We have a in-house application that needs to convert local time to/from UTC for users around the globe and thus need to keep track of when DST begins/ends for each time zone. We use ISO std. time zone conventions (ex. America/ Los_Angeles, Australia/Melbourne etc).

I don't think there's an ISO standard for those time zone names - unless somebody standardized them in some official document, they're just the convention used by the current version of the Olson time zone database (and I think at least some systems using that database might not use that convention, e.g. Solaris). As for keeping informed, that depends on what "keeping informed" means: if it means keeping absolutely up-to-the-minute about time zone rules, the only way to do that is to find out where various countries - or regions of countries - post notices about time zone rules, and monitor those sources; if it means keeping "reasonably" up-to-date, following this list, and picking up updates to the Olson database, would work; if it means keeping as up-to-date as the vendors of the OSes on which your application runs keep those OSes up to date, the application could use whatever APIs and databases the OSes use (not all of them use the Olson database - *most* UN*Xes do, but I don't think HP-UX does, and Windows definitely doesn't).

Ezequiel Colombo escribió el 08/10/08 14:18:

I strongly agree with Nicolas, the event last week was caused by a previous *guess* as you can see here (http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.time.tz/2015) and has been causing several problems in our systems these days. Our government hasn't released any new law describing DST for this year so there isn's any reason to include 2008 (and future) Rules for Argentina.

In my case i haven't included the '08s Rule in my tzdata last year, but i'm using some JAVA software that has included it in their tzupdater tool. Now i have to wait for a fixed tzdata and then wait for SUN to release the tzupdater tool including that tzdata.

Please do not make the same mistake twice, the rules should be based on laws or formal government announcements.

Hi folks... sorry 'bout me being silent so long... I have some personal problems (added to the fact that I also work for a living, which I guess Olsen, Eggert, Elz and most people on this list also do)... Let's put a couple of things in perspective... For starters, I had the same problem as most sysadmins in Argentina since I use the standard debian/ubuntu upgrades and tzdata2008f had not been installed in my machines by last Sunday (see my post -in Spanish- at http://clueless.com.ar/articles/que-hora-es). As Ezequiel notes, tzdata updates take some time to find its way into different unix distros, let alone java (and maybe other) runtime / development environments... and in most unixes, at least an average sysadmin always has a way to dowload the current tzcode/tzdata and have it up to date, I don't think an average developer is able to download the current tzdata and generate a working jre that inlcudes it. Nicolás is in part right than given our government's lazyness (stupidty?) in not defining this with a reasonable prevision (6 months seems reasonable to me), in that from the sysamdin pov it'd be better to not put *any* dst rule until there's an official decree (note that there actually *is* a Law, from December, and it's so stupid that instead of puting a clear rule for changing dst and allowing it to be modified by the Executive Branch, it forces the Executive to pass a decree *every year*). Most sysadmins in Argentina (me included) were not thinking about dst last week because nothing was spoken about it in the media or anywhere else and we definitively don't have a tradition of /regular/ dst changes, (I can't seem to understand why). All of us raised tickets in our distros' bug trackers... in some cases pointing at simply the need for an upstream sync, in other cases without any clue as for where the problem is (that's ok, most of the time I raise a case, I don't have a clue of where the problem is, or if it is distro-specific or upstream or whatever)... some distro maintainers got accused of having false data (even after the update to 2008f/g, because of the tentative Oct-19 change) and some of them pointed their fingers here... Anyway, shouting at distro and tzdata maintainers and pointing fingers won't do any good... What we can do is to discuss what is the best strategy for updating tzdata in the lack of oficial data... in order to do this, we must put in perspective what tzdata is and what its maintainers do... 1) I am nobody here... I don't maintain anything and nobody called me or elected me to do anything... I am just a simple tzdata user who lives in Argentina and in the past I've been indirectly responsible for the administration of a few important servers where I thought it was important to have the date and timezone correct. 2) If I understand it correctly, Arthur David Olson is the official maintainer of tzcode and tzdata... I suspect (but I don't know or care) that he was kind of self-appointed or was appointed by his employer (which, for his mail address, I guess is the National Cancer Institute in the USA). I understand he is the main coder here... 3) For what I've seen, Paul Eggert is somehow the "database master" of tzdata (maybe the one who is more fluent with it?) and does most of the editing (I guess it is also somehow self-appointed). 4) I've seen Robert Elz here for years... I don't know if he has an offiical role in tzcode/tzdata, but he always participates in the mailing list, with opinion about code bugs, database information and policy. 5) Through the last 7 years that I've been subscribed to the list ('thought the list is much older than that), these three people and many, many more have worked for me for free on demand... Whenever I found I needed to change data in the database (because there would be a change in Argentina which wasn't there), I simply had to find some reasonable source for it and explain in plain English what the change would be, Paul would translate my words into tzdatese giving me a patch that I could apply immediatly and David would publish it a few days later... and all for a nice and simple "thank you guys" here and there... I know, they had side-benefits, because now they have 2 grains of my little knowledge sand in their information dune, but they didn't especially needed it since, sooner or later one of them would've found out somewhere that Argentina would change its timezone rules that year. 6) I know David and Paul would like to have more up to date information about Argentina, but my daily problems make me quite ungrateful to them so I come here only when I want and don't participate on a regular basis (and in spite of that, they keep working for me)... every know and then another Argentinian stops by... sometimes with information, sometimes only to complain about wrong data (this happens with people from everywhere, I'm just being local about a country which hasn't many people participating in this list)... I know David and Paul would also like /them/ to participate more, but they don't complain, so let's not complain about wrong data, but only point it out (so they can fix it for us... again, free of charge). And now for what we can do: We could keep our policy of "informated guess" (the most informators, the better the guess) and risk having the problems that happened last Sunday... the other policy would be "wait and see" which might have worked better this time, but I am not sure. As for the problem that Ezequiel poses (about java's tzdata implementation)... I don't program in java (nor any other language, for that matter) but, as I stated above, I don't know if Joe Average Java is able to generate by himself a jre or jdk or whatever that be given an updated tzdata file or if he has to wait for Sun to publish a patch or release or something... In the later case, my guess is that the "guess and publish soon" policy in the long rung will work better... question... when the Law 26.350 was published on December 28th, 2007 ruling a dst change at 0:00 December 30th (that is less than 48 hours in advance)... how long it took to have the java timezones right? I think we should keep the current policy (though we *should* keep discussing it and the discussion may make me change my opinion). Anyway... I just heard on the radio that *apparently* dst *would* change in Argentina next Sunday (so 2008f/g *would* be valid)... I didn't find official info about it, but I'll try to look for it later today. Regards. -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- I am a Marxist--of the Groucho tendency. Anonymous, French slogan -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2008 13:22:49 -0300 From: Nicolas Alvarez <nicolas.alvarez@gmail.com> Message-ID: <gcimog$sa8$1@ger.gmane.org> | So basically the current tzdata has a *guess* at when it *might* be. Everything in tzdata that claims to indicate what will happen in the future is a guess as to what might happen. How can it be otherwise? Unless the timezone code says nothing at all about times from the date of its creation (that is from the reeast time of each tzdata update - so the "date" command on your system would always give the current time in UTC) it cannot really do otherwise. None of is is able to predict the future with certainty, all we can ever do is guess. Now some of the guesses are ones we can be reasonably confident about, like when summer time will end in the US this year, others are total speculation as we get no data at all on what is happening, and many others are somewhere in between - but they are all guesses, and if we were required to avoid using any guesses (predictions) at all the whole thing would be a disaster. | As you probably know, many operating systems had their time wrong last week | because tzdata said DST would start on the 5th. Ubuntu took days to update | the tzdata since the report. The current package says it will start on the | 19th. Yes, we try hard to get the best information we can, and make the most reliable estimations of what is likely to happen, and most of the time things work out the way we'd like. Sometimes they don't. What really matters is the accuracy of the information that we can obtain, and how early that information reaches us. We know there are places where summer time rules seem to be decided upon a whim the day before the event, but I suspect that most of this is just perception - things like airline timetables for international flights cannot simply be changed with a day's notice. So what is most likely the problem is just that the information is not getting through, rather than it does not exist. That is, I am reasonably confident that there are people in Argentina who really know whether summer time will start Oct 19 this year or not, and if not, when (if at all.) The issue is getting that information from the people who know and to the people who maintain tzdata. Someone who cares needs to do that, this year, and in the future (until perhaps things stabilise and there are less surprises.) | If the government doesn't say *anything* about DST, Why would they not? That is, if asked? If no-one bothers to ask, that's a different issue, that is is you just sit passively and hope to be informed, but why not go out and ask??? That's what I asked for in an earlier message - no-one seems to have done anything (beyond speculating.) | what will you do? Change the rules on the 18th to remove the DST? No, because on the 18th we still will not know one way or the other, on this assumption (that no-one bothers to find out in advance.) What would happen is that on the 19th we will find out what actually happened, and if we were wrong, we will correct it then. That's obviously not ideal, but if no-one is going to say any more than "I haven't heard anything yet" then what choice is there? The reason you aren't hearing anything may be because they assume you already know from earlier announcements (the actual "prepare to change your clocks" messages usually only start appearing a day or two before the actual event, even in places with very stable summer time rules.) Note here that no-one simply decided that Oct 5, and then Oct 19, would be good days to screw with the Argentinian people. They came from the most reliable information we have been able to find so far. The legislation that said summer time would start in Oct was last December, so it cannot reasonably have meant Oct 2007, it must have meant 2008. It has been suggested that that legislation has been repealed, if so, find some authoritative source - ie: get someone who really knows to say something (and ideally a reference to some official doc, if it is available on the net, even better) and send that. Then we will have more up to date, and reliable information, and the rules will get updated (well, actually that's a guess too, as that's also in the future, but it has always happened in the past...) | Do you know how much time it will take for all distros to have it? | Definitely more than a day, so on the 19th | we'll have the same mess again. Yes. Unfortunately. Unless someone actually does the work to get better information that's what is going to happen (assuming summer time does not start on the 19th, at the minute that seems more likely than other scenarios). kre

Robert Elz escribió el 09/10/08 09:48:

Yes, we try hard to get the best information we can, and make the most reliable estimations of what is likely to happen, and most of the time things work out the way we'd like. Sometimes they don't. What really matters is the accuracy of the information that we can obtain, and how early that information reaches us. We know there are places where summer time rules seem to be decided upon a whim the day before the event, but I suspect that most of this is just perception - things like airline timetables for international flights cannot simply be changed with a day's notice. So what is most likely the problem is just that the information is not getting through, rather than it does not exist.

That is, I am reasonably confident that there are people in Argentina who really know whether summer time will start Oct 19 this year or not, and if not, when (if at all.) The issue is getting that information from the people who know and to the people who maintain tzdata. Someone who cares needs to do that, this year, and in the future (until perhaps things stabilise and there are less surprises.)

Well... you'd be surprised about this... but this seems to be the way National Policy is done in Argentina (and it's not something specific about the current authorities, I've seen this happen year after year, government after government from the 1990's up to now)

| If the government doesn't say *anything* about DST,

Why would they not? That is, if asked? If no-one bothers to ask, that's a different issue, that is is you just sit passively and hope to be informed, but why not go out and ask???

That's what I asked for in an earlier message - no-one seems to have done anything (beyond speculating.)

Whenever that is true for me (that is *I* didn't take the time -this time- to find out further away than google), I was interviewed yesterday from someone from a major newspaper who's been contacting people in different relevant offices of the Executive Branch and noone had a clue about it... Anyway, for what I read in http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1057552&pid=5188890&toi=6279 finally yesterday de President decided to go on with the DST change next Sunday (so 2008f and 2008g are right about it)... I didn't find the official information yet... the "Boletín Oficial" has nothing about it today (http://www.boletinoficial.gov.ar/Bora.Portal/?seccion=1&rubro=Legislacion) and neither has the "Servicio de Hidrografía Naval" updated its published table (http://www.hidro.gov.ar/Observatorio/QueHoraUtiliza.asp#USOS%20HORARIOS%20AD...) -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future. Niels Bohr Danish physicist (1885 - 1962) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Robert Elz escribió el 09/10/08 14:10:

Date: Thu, 09 Oct 2008 10:49:33 -0300 From: Mariano Absatz - El Baby <baby@baby.com.ar> Message-ID: <48EE0BED.8030808@baby.com.ar>

| Anyway, for what I read in | http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1057552&pid=5188890&toi=6279 | finally yesterday de President decided to go on with the DST change next | Sunday (so 2008f and 2008g are right about it)...

So you mean the 19th ? (next Sunday to me would be the 12th - though I appreciate that not everyone treats those words that way)

Yeah... I mean the 19th... consider "next" as a mistake of not knowing where or /when/ I'm living in... sorry 'bout the confussion. -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- on top-posting...

Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.

...

Why is top-posting such a bad thing?

...

Top-posting.

...

What is the most annoying thing on usenet and in e-mail?

TOPIC: Posting Etiquette -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Mariano Absatz - El Baby escribió el 09/10/08 17:18:

Well... besides the news in this morning's printed edition of "La Nación" (http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1057552) I sent earlier, now "Clarín" (the other major newspaper here) said 3 hours ago in its electronic edition (http://www.clarin.com/diario/2008/10/09/um/m-01777946.htm) the same information, adding that "*In the coming days*, president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner will sign the decree that mandates forwarding the clocks between October 19th and March 14th, 2009(...)" so far for timely legislation...

The on-line edition of "La Nación" also states (http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1057701) that the Province of Mendoza will *not* adhere to the DST change this year and that other Provinces may follow it in the decision.

In fact, a few days ago, the Governor of Mendoza sent a Provincial Law Project to the Province Legislature saying that the Province will not change the time even if the Nation does (http://www.cuyonoticias.com.ar/index.php/politica/1034-mendoza-seguira-la-ho...).

So Mendoza is actually being more timely than the Federal Government.

Maybe we should modify 'southamerica' to note this...

Now, in the complete speculation game, my personal guess is that at least San Luis will also stay in UTC-03:00 and not apply DST... I dunno about other provinces.

According to the above article from "La Nación", Provinces which might not adhere (besides Mendoza and San Luis), include Tucumán, Catamarca and San Juan...

Worst thing is that I can't seem to find reliable sources other than the press... and for Provincial matters, the National media are not that trustworthy... Well... as usual, it is already *that week* and I don't have any reliable sources... my appeal for help (http://clueless.com.ar/articles/llamado-a-la-solidaridad) didn't get one response...

For what I see in the provincial press, the following provinces will *not* apply DST this year: * Mendoza * San Juan * San Luis * Catamarca * La Rioja Only sources are provincial media: http://www.lagaceta.com.ar/nota/295171/Informacion_General/pais_partira_dos_... http://www.mdzol.com/mdz/nota/76760-Mendoza-y-otras-cuatro-provincias-no-cam... http://www.ciudadanodiario.com.ar/nota.php?id=59894 At least they don't contradict each other... -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Sometimes I get the feeling the whole world is against me, but deep down I know that's not true. Some smaller countries are neutral. Robert Orben American magician and comedy writer (1927 - ) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Mariano Absatz - El Baby wrote:

and translate:

/Everything shows that starting this Sunday, Argentina will have two time zones. At least five provinces would not move forward the clocks. San Luis and Mendoza already confirmed it and in La Rioja, San Juan and Catamarca they say there is no oficial decision yet, but "very probably" they will not move the clock hands. They afirm that light and darkness hours do not agree with the lifestyle and customs in the provinces and that last year many people had problems to sleep./

It seems to be official in Catamarca and San Juan as well now, according to the press: http://www.diarioc.com.ar/inf_general/No_habra_cambio_de_horario_en_Catamarc... which says something like this (translated): "The governor of the province, Eduardo Brizuela del Moral ratified, in official way that the time zone change that is requested from nation after 19th of the current month will not occur in our province because as we already know it does not benefit our town." http://www.diariodecuyo.com.ar/home/new_noticia.php?noticia_id=308387 (San Juan) Translation: "San Juan’s provincial governor José Luis Gioja confirmed today [2008-10-15], that the province would not participate in the daylight saving schedule that was planned by the federal government." Best regards, Steffen - timeanddate.com

On Thu, Oct 16, 2008 at 01:36:37PM +0200, Petr Machata wrote:

I'm eyeing the sources, and is seems to me that we need to split America/Argentina/Catamarca in two, one for Catamarca (which doesn't plan to introduce the DST), and one for Chubut (which does). The most populous city in Chubut, per wikipedia, is Comodoro Rivadavia, "often referred simply as Comodoro", hence the zone would be America/Argentina/Comodoro.

There is already America/Argentina/ComodRivadavia; you might want to use that.

Clint Adams escribió el 16/10/08 10:36:

On Thu, Oct 16, 2008 at 01:36:37PM +0200, Petr Machata wrote:

...

I'm eyeing the sources, and is seems to me that we need to split America/Argentina/Catamarca in two, one for Catamarca (which doesn't plan to introduce the DST), and one for Chubut (which does). The most populous city in Chubut, per wikipedia, is Comodoro Rivadavia, "often referred simply as Comodoro", hence the zone would be America/Argentina/Comodoro.

There is already America/Argentina/ComodRivadavia; you might want to use that.

Mmmhhh America/Argentina/ComodRivadavia is a link in the backward file... and I don't like either the contraction "ComodRivadavia" or "Comodoro" which is a generic naval rank (as would be "Real Admiral")... I think America/Argentina/Comodoro_Rivadavia would be a better choice (in the same line as America/Argentina/Buenos_Aires... and we could change the link entry in backward to point to it... Here's a patch (against 2008h) which does what I say... One historical question... I find that all cities, up until 1894-10-31 refer to LMT (Lima Mean Time?)... but all have different offsets... after that and up until May 1920, all refer to CMT (Córdoba Mean Time) at a fixed -4:16:48 offset. Which is the source for the LMT offsets?... 'cause I'm happily copying and pasting and for sure introducing errors in the past... not that I'm afraid of the butterfly effect, but I'd rather not introduce wronful data... Paul? -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- You can't run sausage backwards through a meat grinder and end up with a whole pig. -- Tim Peoples talking about the irreversability of UNIX password encoding -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Andy Lipscomb escribió el 16/10/08 13:26:

"One historical question... I find that all cities, up until 1894-10-31 refer to LMT (Lima Mean Time?)... but all have different offsets... after that and up until May 1920, all refer to CMT (Córdoba Mean Time) at a fixed -4:16:48 offset.

Which is the source for the LMT offsets?... 'cause I'm happily copying and pasting and for sure introducing errors in the past... not that I'm afraid of the butterfly effect, but I'd rather not introduce wronful data..."

LMT actually stands for Local Mean Time. In other words, average solar time at that location. It can be computed from longitude--each degree of west longitude converts to four minutes behind UTC; otherwise put, a 15-degree longitude difference equals a one-hour LMT difference.

OK, now I get it... I'll find out longitudes of all the cities in America/Argentina, do the math and propose a patch... but before that... today appeared in the Boletín Oficial of the Province of Mendoza the Provincial Law 7.955 (http://www.gobernac.mendoza.gov.ar/boletin/pdf/20081016-28259-normas.pdf) It says that Mendoza will use UTC-03:00 and UTC-04:00... and that the Provincial Executive Branch (the Governor) has the power to establish which one will be in effect and when... (along the same lines as the National Law, but with different time zones)... However, neither that Law, nor the Decree #2.807 that promulgates it, says anything about what will be done in the next few days (or months)... So, it's reasonable to think that at least until March 2009, Mendoza will keep using UTC-03:00, however, I think we should say that Mendoza is actually observing DST from its now standard WART (that is, it is at WARST, which is the same as ART)... am I right? Or is it just to messy? I enclose a new patch (always against 2008h). -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Beware of programmers with screwdrivers. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Mariano Absatz - El Baby wrote:

It says that Mendoza will use UTC-03:00 and UTC-04:00...

Wow! Correctness at last! (geographically, Argentina is almost completely in the GMT-4 zone)

Can someone point me to a site that has Argentina DST changes for 2008 ? Thanks Vilas -- -----Original Message----- From: Petr Machata [mailto:pmachata@redhat.com] Sent: Friday, October 17, 2008 1:46 AM To: tz@lecserver.nci.nih.gov Subject: Re: Argentina DST blues Mariano Absatz - El Baby wrote:

Clint Adams escribió el 16/10/08 10:36:

...

On Thu, Oct 16, 2008 at 01:36:37PM +0200, Petr Machata wrote:

...

I'm eyeing the sources, and is seems to me that we need to split America/Argentina/Catamarca in two, one for Catamarca (which doesn't plan to introduce the DST), and one for Chubut (which does). The most populous city in Chubut, per wikipedia, is Comodoro Rivadavia, "often referred simply as Comodoro", hence the zone would be America/Argentina/Comodoro.

There is already America/Argentina/ComodRivadavia; you might want to use that.

Mmmhhh America/Argentina/ComodRivadavia is a link in the backward file... and I don't like either the contraction "ComodRivadavia" or "Comodoro" which is a generic naval rank (as would be "Real Admiral")... I think America/Argentina/Comodoro_Rivadavia would be a better choice

Yeah, but "a file name component must not exceed 14 characters [...]" (it's in the Theory file). That's why I used Comodoro in the first place (not noticing the backlink), and that's the reason the backlink name has so awkward spelling. I'd rather reuse the already existing backlink, if it's not a problem to change a backlink back to a full-fledged zone, just to keep the namespace cleaner. PM

Keep rockin'... Now officially, the Nation exceptuated 12 Provinces from the Decree 1693 via a new Decree 1705 that appeared today in the Boletín Oficial: http://www.boletinoficial.gov.ar/Bora.Portal/CustomControls/PdfContent.aspx?... The Provinces that will NOT apply DST are the following ones: CATAMARCA LA RIOJA MENDOZA SALTA SAN JUAN SAN LUIS LA PAMPA NEUQUEN RIO NEGRO CHUBUT SANTA CRUZ TIERRA DEL FUEGO, ANTARTIDA E ISLAS DEL ATLANTICO SUR I'll try to create a new patch, considering what Petr Machata sent earlier and this info, and will send it to the list later. Regards. -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- It isn't easy being the parent of a six-year-old. However, it's a pretty small price to pay for having somebody around the house who understands computers. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Hi there, again... whereas the National Decree from last Friday didn't include Jujuy among the Provinces excepted from the DST change and that was the information in Saturday morning papers (http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1060668), on Saturday afternoon the news was that Jujuy would NOT apply DST on Sunday (http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1060788), which was confirmed in the Sunday morning printed edition (http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1060982). In the Jujuy Government's portal (http://www.jujuy.gov.ar/) there's a small reference to this in the Government activity section (http://www.jujuy.gov.ar/index2/gobernacion/) but the "read more" link points to another press release... I managed to follow their naming logic and found the correct press release at http://www.jujuy.gov.ar/index2/partes_prensa/18_10_08/235-181008.doc (it's a Word document). The enclosed patch does the following: References Decrees 1693 and 1705 from the Argentina's Boletín Oficial and the press release from the Province of Jujuy. Splits America/Argentina/Cordoba into America/Argentina/Salta, adjusting LMT for the latter for dates up to 1894-10-31 Adjusts the following zones not to apply DST from now on: America/Argentina/Salta America/Argentina/Jujuy America/Argentina/Catamarca America/Argentina/La_Rioja America/Argentina/San_Juan America/Argentina/Mendoza America/Argentina/San_Luis America/Argentina/Rio_Gallegos America/Argentina/Ushuaia Adds the new zone into zone.tab Reorders America/Argentina/* within zone.tab according to the instructions within the file (geographical sense / most populous first) Reorders America/Argentina/* within southamerica to have the same order as within zone.tab I also uploaded a tz file for Argentina with this info at http://wiki.clueless.com.ar/ActualizarTimezonesConTzdata?action=AttachFile&d... There are instructions (in Spanish) to download and compile it at http://wiki.clueless.com.ar/ActualizarTimezonesConTzdata#parche_baby_2008_10 -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Maintenance-free: When it breaks, it can't be fixed... -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Mariano Absatz - El Baby wrote:

Now officially, the Nation exceptuated 12 Provinces from the Decree 1693 via a new Decree 1705 that appeared today in the Boletín Oficial:

http://www.boletinoficial.gov.ar/Bora.Portal/CustomControls/PdfContent.aspx?...

Despite the decree - the Jujuy province decided not to observe DST. Some sources: http://www.infobae.com/contenidos/409849-100894-0-Jujuy-decidi%C3%B3-no-camb... http://www.lmneuquen.com.ar/noticias/2008/10/18/7937.php Regards, Steffen - timeanddate.com

Thanx for the link Steffen, whenever the Decree is dated on October 15th, since it is published in today's (Oct 16th) Boletín Oficial, then it's in force since today... we're doing better... it's 2 and 1/2 days in advance (instead of 1 1/2 like last December)... Steffen Thorsen escribió el 16/10/08 09:42:

Finally something on an official site: Decreto/Decree 1693/2008 (dated 2008-10-15) is now released today (2008-10-16) in the Boletin Oficial No 31.511, with the dates as announced earlier:

http://www.boletinoficial.gov.ar/Bora.Portal/CustomControls/PdfContent.aspx?...

Best regards, Steffen - timeanddate.com

-- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Sarcasm is just one more service we offer. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Nicolas Alvarez escribió el 19/10/08 01:04:

This is going to be a disaster again, anyway. The date just arrived, and my clock didn't change.

are you in the DST applying region? what version of tzdata are you using? what is your /etc/localtime? my standard tzdata2008h from the ubuntu repositories handled the change 20 minutes ago without a hitch (see the "Date:" header of this message... it should say "-0200" at the end)...

I wish I could go and personally slap our president, then tell her that there is no way in hell tzdata maintainers can get everything set up *and* Linux distro maintainers can update the tzdata package in TWO DAYS.

I think she couldn't care less about it...

And I'll bet BIG money that Microsoft didn't get an update in time either.

The Microsoft procedures are hell... checkout the instrucions at http://www.microsoft.com/argentina/dst/actualizacion.aspx it includes a link to a 20 page pdf... It couldn't be any more manual or cumbersome... Compare that to http://wiki.clueless.com.ar/ActualizarTimezonesConTzdata ... 2 different recipes there... and they cover the whole country, MS wouldn't tell you what to do if you live in Mendoza (in fact, you have to select "Buenos Aires" and uncheck the "apply DST rules"... of course it can't handle correctly times in the past... -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- All generalizations are false, including this one. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Nicolas Alvarez wrote:

Do I have to *logout* to see the change?

Well, I logged out, restarted X (Ctrl-Alt-Backspace), and the clock went correct...

Nicolas Alvarez escribió el 19/10/08 02:13:

Mariano Absatz - El Baby wrote:

...

Nicolas Alvarez escribió el 19/10/08 01:04:

...

This is going to be a disaster again, anyway. The date just arrived, and my clock didn't change.

are you in the DST applying region?

Buenos Aires.

...

what version of tzdata are you using?

2008g-0ubuntu0.8.04. I upgraded to version h (from hardy-proposed) and it still didn't update the KDE clock, and 'date' says I'm in ART, but from a direct terminal (a real TTY, not an X-based console emulator) it did give the right time (ARST). I downgraded back to 'g', and actually I still see the same (ARST on a tty, ART on KDE clock and running 'date' on a terminal emulator). Do I have to *logout* to see the change?

Yes :-)

...

what is your /etc/localtime?

What am I supposed to do with it? I ran "cat" and it filled my terminal with binary junk.

You should run a binary compare to /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Argentina/Buenos_Aires ... in a terminal: $ cmp /etc/localtime /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Argentina/Buenos_Aires if it is silent, it's OK (they're identical)

...

...

And I'll bet BIG money that Microsoft didn't get an update in time either.

The Microsoft procedures are hell... checkout the instrucions at http://www.microsoft.com/argentina/dst/actualizacion.aspx it includes a link to a 20 page pdf...

It couldn't be any more manual or cumbersome...

I'm wondering what should I tell everyone I know who uses Windows? Clearly I can't just give them the link to microsoft, since it's such a mess. But I definitely don't want to let them naively *change the clock*.

quick and dirty NO WARRANTIES: login to an account with administrator rights 1) backup the registry (just in case) 2) download ms-tz-argentina-2008-10-16.reg from http://wiki.clueless.com.ar/ActualizarTimezonesConTzdata?action=AttachFile&d... (this is a copy I made from the tzupdate.reg referred in MS's pdf instructions). 3) double-click on it and it will ask if you are sure you want to modify the registry, say yes (you have a backup anyway, right? 4) double click on the clock in the systray, the "set date and time" window will open 5) select the "time zone" tab 6) choose "(GMT-03:00) Buenos Aires" 7) make sure the "adjust dst" (or whatever it's called) checkbox in that window is CHECKED 8) press OK that should be it (no need to reboot).

(I'm a contributor to an open source software that REALLY doesn't like the clock changing. We had a user on the forum who apparently used Windows's calendar as a vacation planner, changed the system date a few days forward, then back to the right one, and the program completely stopped working. Presumably would have suddenly started working again after those "few days" passed.)

I don't know anything about this... the pdf speaks quite a lot about handling outlook which, since I don't use I didn't care... at least *you* should read the instructions and try to make some sense of it... -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- I started out with nothing & still have most of it left. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

Steffen Thorsen escribió el 17/10/08 08:23:

The Salta Province in Argentina will not use DST either, as announced on their official site: http://www.salta.gov.ar/ver_noticia.php?id=8009

Thanx, Steffen... I hadn't heard that... now I read in the papers that Nequén, La Rioja and Jujuy wouldn't use DST either... http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1060181 http://www.clarin.com/diario/2008/10/17/sociedad/s-01783032.htm I'm enclosing a new patch that considers that the following Provinces will NOT use DST this year: Mendoza (but it calls UTC-3 WARST) San Juan San Luis Catamarca Salta Neuquén Jujuy La Rioja I also uploaded a tz file for Argentina with this info at http://wiki.clueless.com.ar/ActualizarTimezonesConTzdata?action=AttachFile&d... There are instructions (in Spanish) to download and compile it at http://wiki.clueless.com.ar/ActualizarTimezonesConTzdata#parche_baby_2008_10 I'll try to keep this updated during the weekend, but I make no promises... -- Mariano Absatz - "El Baby" baby@baby.com.ar www.clueless.com.ar -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- C makes it easy to shoot yourself in the foot. C++ makes it harder, but when you do, it blows away your whole leg. -- Bjarne Stroustrup -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- * TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org