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<TITLE>Does zic currently compile time zone abbreviations correctly?</TITLE>
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<P DIR=LTR><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">In the process of extracting time zone information from</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">the</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> zoneinfo database, I noticed that the abbreviation pointer break for quite a few time zones including Europe/London, Asia/Dubai, and quite a few others. The problem seems to be in the</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">compiled time zone files so I spent some time looking at zic. What seems to be happening is that zic uses some criteria to determine of the abbreviation (and other info</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> for types</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">) is used and won</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">’</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">t write it if it</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">thinks it isn</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">’</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">t needed</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">. The</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">problem</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> is that it doesn</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">’</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">t adjust</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">the</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> indexes</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> (tt_abbrind)</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> that reference those abbreviations, so they</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">’</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">ll point to bad data or empty strings. My quick (and admittedly heavy handed fix) was to force zic to write all of the abbreviations, whether they are necessary or not. If this really is a problem, it should probably be fixed at some point.</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> Please note that the data in our fairly recently updated Linux server has abbreviations that don</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">’</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">t seem to work.</FONT></SPAN></P>
<P DIR=LTR><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">If I</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">’</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">m missing something or there is some other way</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">more correct way</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">to reference the</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">abbreviations, please let me</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">know</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">. I</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">’</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">m using tt_abbrind as per the tzfile man page</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"> and</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">the</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">tzcode2007f.tar.gz</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"></FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> <FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">sources.</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial"></FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"> </SPAN></P>
<P DIR=LTR><SPAN LANG="en-us"><FONT SIZE=2 FACE="Arial">John Morrow</FONT></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN><SPAN LANG="en-us"></SPAN></P>
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