Timezone naming

J Wunsch j at uriah.heep.sax.de
Tue Nov 26 21:46:17 UTC 1996


As Markus G. Kuhn wrote:

>   - I hardly ever have seen MET and METDST used anywhere outside the Unix

But we _are_ in the Unix world.  Our ``target market'' is not outside,
but inside this world.

>     world and we can very well assume that MET is today only known because it
>     somehow found its way into the Olson database some time ago. DST is an
>     abbreviation exclusively used in the U.S., most other countries
>     say "summer time".

There's much more Unices around than those using the Olsen database.
Surprisingly (for you :), almost all of them agree on MET, provided
they cover Europe at all.  (There are probably more people disagreeing
on the DST naming though, but remember that the old TZ variable scheme
often only provided for three-letter names for the DST zone, too.)

Even if the Olsen database were really the only source: _you are too
late_.  Correcting a mistake should have been done earlier, not after
years of its use.  The American Indians don't really live in India,
but changing this name after years of usage wouldn't make sense,
either.

> Please forward this list of arguments to the other members of the
> FreeBSD core team...

No need.  We are presenting you our opinions, and those of other
people who we know have the same opinion.

> others and I have done on this subject before the tz databse was
> changed...

Sorry, i can't remember you starting a discussion in de.comp.os.unix.
That's where those affected by your decision can be found.  Why didn't
you ask there what people would prefer?

> > technically correct your choice for CET might be, it breaks tradition,
> > and is in general something people here will consider a ``US-centric''
> > decision.
> 
> The main arguments for the MET->CET came from people in France and
> Germany.

So it must be interesting for you to know that the main arguments
against it do also come from people in these countries now. :-)

(I know of other examples where you've been gratuitously changing
timezone names.  The resulting ``MOST'' was entirely unintelligible
for me, be assured. :)

-- 
cheers, J"org

joerg_wunsch at uriah.heep.sax.de -- http://www.sax.de/~joerg/ -- NIC: JW11-RIPE
Never trust an operating system you don't have sources for. ;-)



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