[tz] permanent DST and North American time zone names

[Chris Walton]

On Wed, Mar 16, 2022 at 3:43 AM Max Harmony <maxh at maxh.name> wrote:
> I'm not familiar with the Canadian Interpretation Act, but I think you're
referring to its definition of standard time? I would expect Canada to make
the same change if the US does it first. Canada has followed previous US
changes to DST, and it seems like the main reason they haven't done this
already is to keep the same time zones as the US.

Section 35 of the Canadian (federal) Interpretation Act has definitions for
Standard Time; it can be found here:
https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/i-21/page-2.html?wbdisable=false#h-279462
It might be updated some day, but I would not hold my breath.  The
definitions for standard time in Yukon, Nunavut, and Quebec are very much
outdated.  i.e. the federal government has made no effort to keep its
Interpretation Act in sync with territorial and provincial time
legislation.  Also keep in mind that each province and territory is
responsible for its own time legislation.  Provinces and territories are
free to choose their own time zone(s) and they are free to adopt or reject
the use of daylight saving.  Realistically, the only people that might care
about the wording in the federal Interpretation Act would be the criminal
and/or corporate lawyers.
>
>
> On 16 Mar 2022, at 02.26, Ephraim Silverberg via tz <tz at iana.org> wrote:
> >
> > Another option would be to just delete the middle letter and use
two-letter abbreviations -- e.g.  EST/EDT -> ET
>
> Let's call this option 4b. I like the idea; there's no need to specify
it's a standard time when that's the only kind it can be. It does seem like
a slight change from its current meaning, though (something happening at
the same time regardless of whether DST is in effect vs. the only time zone
used in the region). I can't think of any reason that would matter, but it
seems like exactly the sort of subtle distinction that breaks things. Of
course, the ?ST names having a different meaning than they used to could
*also* break things.

I agree, option 4b (using "ET" instead of "EST") is compelling.
-chris
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