On Feb 22, 2013, at 6:00 PM, Peter Stagg <P.Stagg@bom.gov.au> wrote:

I'm greatly amused by you referring to the page you have as I am Australian and I work at the Head Office of the BOM and my current issue has arisen from the fact that the "services policy" department of the Bureau wants the 'correct' abbreviation to appear on images and within applications on the web site etc.

http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/time#daylightsaving "Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST) ... Australian Central Standard Time (ACST) ... Australian Western Standard Time (AWST)" http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/averages/tables/daysavtm.shtml "...The LST zones in Australia are as follows: • EST - Australian Eastern Standard Time (+10 UTC) in Qld, NSW, Vic and Tas • CST - Australian Central Standard Time (+9.5 UTC) in NT and SA • WST - Australian Western Standard Time (+8 UTC) in WA DST - Daylight Saving TimeAlso known as summer time, Daylight Saving Time occurs when the time on local clocks is advanced forward by one hour at the beginning of the defined period of DST, and returned back by one hour at the end of DST. The exact dates between which DST is to apply can be obtained from the relevant Australian State governments. Within Australia DST across the time zones is generally denoted by: • EDT - Australian Eastern Daylight Time • CDT - Australian Central Daylight Time" So you should inform whoever is responsible for http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/averages/tables/daysavtm.shtml that either 1) they should use the terms mentioned in http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/time#daylightsaving or 2) they should force whoever is responsible for http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/time#daylightsaving to should use the terms used in http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/averages/tables/daysavtm.shtml or 3) they should indicate that the terms used in http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/averages/tables/daysavtm.shtml are what that site chooses to use and are not in any way to be considered the Official Government-Certified Abbreviations for time zones or 4) they indicate what site contains the Official Government-Certified Abbreviations for time zones or 5) they should indicate that there are no such things as the Official Government-Certified Abbreviations for time zones in Australia. If they end up doing 1), we should go with the abbreviations in http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/time#daylightsaving and cheerfully ignore all complaints. If they end up doing 2), we should go with the abbreviations that end up in http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/time#daylightsaving as a result of that, and cheerfully ignore all complaints. If they end up doing 3), we should go with the abbreviations that end up in http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/time#daylightsaving and cheerfully ignore all complaints. If they end up doing 4), we should go with the abbreviations at that site, and cheerfully ignore all complaints. If they end up doing 5), we should flip a coin and decide which site's abbreviations to use, and cheerfully ignore all complaints. (Yes, there is a common substring in all five of those "we should" phrases. I can't speak for, for example, Paul Eggert, but I would personally prefer to have the TZ database reflect some other entity's authoritative consensus about time zone abbreviations rather than being itself treated as an authority, so that we can force people who don't like what the TZ database says to go pester whichever Somebody Else we're following.) (Note: I'm not picking on Australians here; if any group of any nationality has an objection to the time zone abbreviations in the TZ database for time zones in their country, they should get somebody in a position of authority to designate their preferences as an Official Standard and put forth the Full Force Of The Law to squash all other opinions as to what the abbreviations should be.)

Peter Stagg <P.Stagg@bom.gov.au> wrote:

Is their anything I can do or say to bring some clarity to this issue and perhaps resolve it one way or another?

Can you convince the state and territorial governments to amend their time legislation to specify distinctive abbreviations? That has been the issue raised most frequently by Australian contributors here: time zones are, it has been said, a state matter and the legislation either doesn't specify a name or specifies an ambiguous name. None specify abbreviations. In the alternative, perhaps convincing a national IT standards body to undertake an effort to define such abbreviations would indicate sufficient consensus to change the abbreviations used in tzdata. -GAWollman

If your bureau want to use "correct" abbreviations, they should probably start by contacting the various state government departments that actually define the time zones, and ask them what they believe should be used - as best we have ever been able to tell, there are no defined zone name abbreviations anywhere, just full names, which essentially never have "Australian" in their names (which makes sense, none of the state governments could really define what is Australian time after all) and in most cases, use Summer Time as the name for the time when Standard Time does not apply (not Daylight Savings Time).

kre

From the New South Wales (NSW) government website:

"Where Daylight saving is observed NSW, ACT,Vic and Tas move from AEST to Australian Eastern Daylight Time (AEDT), and clocks are advanced to UTC +11. SA and the NSW town of Broken Hill move from ACST to Australian Central Daylight Time (ACDT), and clocks are advanced to UTC +10 ½. Daylight saving is not observed in Queensland, the Northern Territory or Western Australia." http://communityrelations.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/cru/daylight/definitions_of_tim...

From the Victorian (Vic) government website:

"Move your clock backward one hour at 3am (Daylight Saving Time)" http://www.business.vic.gov.au/operating-a-business/how-to-start/trading-hou... "Question: What is the time difference between Victoria and Western Australia?: Answer: There are three timezones across Australia. Information about the time observed in these zones can be found on the Australian Government website. " http://ask.vic.gov.au/FA/Hybrid/Themes/infovic/displayresult.asp?MesId=11134...

From the Tasmania (Tas) government website:

While they don’t use abbreviations for the eastern states they do reference the WA timezone using the format specified on the Australian government website. "As a result, Western Australia will not observe daylight saving and will remain on Australian Western Standard Time (AWST) all year." http://www.dpac.tas.gov.au/divisions/policy/daylightsavings

From the South Australian government website:

While I couldn't find any abbreviations on their website but 3/4 is a pretty good argument to change the status quo. http://www.safework.sa.gov.au/show_page.jsp?id=2675

Brian Inglis said:

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From the Victorian (Vic) government website:

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http://ask.vic.gov.au/FA/Hybrid/Themes/infovic/displayresult.asp?MesId=11134... "There are three timezones across Australia.

Given that there seem to be at least five, this doesn't seem too reliable. -- Clive D.W. Feather | If you lie to the compiler, Email: clive@davros.org | it will get its revenge. Web: http://www.davros.org | - Henry Spencer Mobile: +44 7973 377646

On Mar 29, 2013, at 4:25 PM, Random832 wrote:

On 03/29/2013 02:17 PM, Clive D.W. Feather wrote:

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http://ask.vic.gov.au/FA/Hybrid/Themes/infovic/displayresult.asp?MesId=11134... "There are three timezones across Australia. Given that there seem to be at least five, this doesn't seem too reliable.

How do you figure? Consider that in common layperson usage, "time zones" only refers to the standard offset itself (and perhaps the basic name Eastern/Central/Western), not whether/when daylight savings is in effect.

Then there would be four -- the fourth being Eucla, offset 8:45. paul

Clive D.W. Feather <clive <at> davros.org> writes:

Random832 said:

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"There are three timezones across Australia. Given that there seem to be at least five, this doesn't seem too reliable.

How do you figure? Consider that in common layperson usage, "time zones" only refers to the standard offset itself (and perhaps the basic name Eastern/Central/Western), not whether/when daylight savings is in effect.

In winter, there are five common clock settings (including Lord Howe Island and Eucla), while in summer there are six. Neither of those numbers feels consistent with "three".

(Note that this is not like the continental USA, which only has four values at any time of year, even if the boundaries shift around.)

I feel this is getting off topic arguing the technicality of how many timezones there are detracts from the point that the database contains abbreviations that are ambiguous and are not recognised by everyday Australians, state, federal or territory governments. It seems that the abbreviations were created due to legislation mentioning summer time rather than daylight savings, although there has been no evidence I've seen presented that EST is a regconised abbreviation of Easter Summer time in Australia. On the other hand I presented multiple government sites as reference for the use of the Australian Governments abbreviation format. But if we must. As already mentioned the common layperson usage of timezones in Australia is that there is only three as these timezones cover the vast majority of the population. As further reference please see the Western Australia's official tourism site: "There are three time zones in Australia: Time Zone Clocks Western Standard Time (AWST - GMT + 8:00) in Western Australia Central Standard Time (ACST - GMT + 9:30) in South Australia and Northern Territory; and Eastern Standard Time (AEST - GMT +10:00) which operates in New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania and Queensland. ACST is half an hour behind AEST, while AWST is two hours behind AEST." http://www.westernaustralia.com/en/Travel_Info/Important_Travel_Tips/Pages/T... I must say its rather belittling as an Australian to see how many times my fellow Australians have brought up this issue only to be ignored and told that the abbreviations we use everyday are not correct.

On Sat, 23 Feb 2013, Peter Stagg wrote:

Is their anything I can do or say to bring some clarity to this issue and perhaps resolve it one way or another?

The tzdata project attempts to follow legislation or official standards, where they are known, or common practice, where that is consistent. In the case of Australia, official standards appear to be defined at the state level (not the Australian Commonwealth Government level), and the relevant state legislation appears to define phrases like "Eastern Standard Time" and "Eastern Summer Time", not abbreviations. Common practice in Australia appears to be inconsistent, with some government and non-government sources using abbreviations like "AEST" and some using abbreviations like "EST". Given the absence of consistency in common practice, the tzdata project has chosen to retain the status quo every time this issue has been discussed. It's probably worth pointing out that the status quo is consistent with the legislation, in that the abbreviations used by the tzdata project match the first letters of the words of the official time zone names. For example, the legislated names "Eastern Standard Time" and "Eastern Summer Time" are both abbreviated to "EST". The two most likely reasons for the tzdata project to change its Australian time zone abbreviations are: 1. If an "official" set of preferred abbreviations were set out in a statement from a recognised national standards body, or in a collection of statements from recognised state governments, and if somebody notices the fact and reports it to the tzdata project. 2. If the people in Australia start being consistent in their choice of timezone abbreviations, and if somebody notices the fact and reports it to the tzdata project. You may be in a position to cause some sort of official statement to be made. You may also be in a position to cause government-related web sites in Australia to be more consistent. --apb (Alan Barrett)

Just thought I'd add that doing a google search of the BOM site for AEST shows quite a lot of examples of its use. https://www.google.com.au/search?q=site:bom.gov.au+AEST As do the other AXXX timezones. On 25 February 2013 10:31, Shaun Bouckaert <shaun.bouckaert@gmail.com> wrote:

I would like to add my own voice to this issue once again. Over the last couple of years I've brought this up, and a few times quite a bit of support has been there.

One of the issues in trying to get people to be consistent with their use of timezones is that a lot of timezone notation comes straight from tzdata, and trying to establish what use has been intentional and what use is simply because that's the current state of the tzdata is not easy.

There was also a collection of sources gathered that compared what formats were common amongst different organisations, which showed, IIRC, that the AXXX formats were not uncommon, and were one of the more common formats.

I also remember finding that at the time the BOM encouraged the use of the AXXX timezones and listed "technical reasons" as to being why they also used the XXX timezones.

Shaun