[tz] Missing entry for Heard Island and MacDonald Islands

[Paw Boel Nielsen]

There are sources that indicate the islands in periods has been inhabited a several times in the past. In addition to this the islands has been assigned an ISO 3166-2 code and even a top-level domain. I see no reason why a zone should not be created.

Just my two cents.


-----Original Message-----
From: tz-bounces at iana.org [mailto:tz-bounces at iana.org] On Behalf Of Paul Eggert
Sent: 12 May 2012 02:14
To: Garrett Wollman
Cc: Time zone mailing list
Subject: Re: [tz] Missing entry for Heard Island and MacDonald Islands

On 05/11/2012 03:36 PM, Garrett Wollman wrote:
> The historical practice of the maintainers up to this point has been 
> that locations that are uninhabited do not get a zone.

Yes, the idea is that the tz database attempts to record common real-world practice at a location.  Local time is undefined if there are no locals.  It's like trying to define the temperature of a true vacuum.

A  goal of the tz database design is to lessen the need for arguments.  Omitting uninhabited locations is one small way to further that goal.