<font face="times new roman,serif">I just want to make sure that people realize that the tz abbrevations are at most useful as internal identifiers. </font><div><font face="times new roman,serif"><br></font></div><div><font face="times new roman,serif">Most of them are not recognizable by end users at all, and are not appropriate for display or choice by end users.<br clear="all">
</font><font face="'times new roman', serif"><div style="background-color:transparent;margin-top:0px;margin-left:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-right:0px;font-family:Times;font-size:medium"><span style="font-family:'times new roman', serif;font-size:small"><br>
</span></div><div style="background-color:transparent;margin-top:0px;margin-left:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-right:0px;font-family:Times;font-size:medium"><span style="font-family:'times new roman', serif;font-size:small">Mark</span></div>
</font><font face="'times new roman', serif"><i>— Il meglio è l’inimico del bene —</i></font><div><font face="'times new roman', serif"><i><br></i></font><div><font face="'times new roman', serif"><i><span style="font-style:normal"><div style="background-color:transparent;margin-top:0px;margin-left:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-right:0px">
[<a href="https://plus.google.com/114199149796022210033" target="_blank">https://plus.google.com/114199149796022210033</a>]</div><i></i></span><i></i></i></font></div></div><br>
<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Dec 7, 2011 at 11:03, Steven Abner <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:pheonix@zoomtown.com">pheonix@zoomtown.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
Thank you for the input!<br>
Maybe I should clarify the file. This is an attempt to allow users or peoples access to their times zones.<br>
A date string, publication, scanned document, broadcast, etc. can contain the time zone. The tz database<br>
even includes these time zones. Some functions even require them to operate.<br>
Take the "conceptional problem" example. BRT/BRST are the abbreviations used for the Brazilia Time<br>
zone. The ":America/Sao_Paulo" file/location is defined as using the Brazilia Time rule "Brazil". Since this<br>
location follows Brazilia Time, it is given the abbreviation for that zone. It is not given a synonym for an<br>
offset from UTC. An example to clarify could be the recent offset change of Moscow Time zone from an<br>
offset of 3 to that of 4. MSK is the abbreviation for the regional time zone using the standard time definition of<br>
that zone. The ":Europe/Moscow" file assigns the offset used for that zone. The Moscow file can now safely<br>
be used to represent the "Moskva" rule that is the regional time zone, rather than creating a new zone. Since<br>
it is the only location that uses that time zone, one can assign ":Europe/Moscow" file as a link.<br>
The GMT example is an oddity case. GMT can stand both for a time, :Etc/GMT which I assume is the<br>
observatory location, and the English Isles regional time zone. I am also guessing that that was one of<br>
the reasons for UTC, so that an offset of 0 from the observatory would be taken as the offset rather the<br>
the time zone the English use.<br>
I also only compiled the times, as stated in the file, from 1970 to present. It is known that abbreviations<br>
are not unique. However, the list of conflicting zones, see near the end of file, is really small. Especially<br>
when Australia is assigned the local, state, country definitions and Indonesia.<br>
I will look farther into the assignment to see if any additional zones need creation. As it is clear that a<br>
present location might not actually be assigned to a time zone. I did not try to resolve conflicts, just link<br>
to the base location file that defined the actual time zone for a region. I did try to make sure to avoid not<br>
linking a file that didn't represent the regional time zone, but best to be safe.<br>
<br>
Thanks again, was helpful!<br>
Steve<br>
</blockquote></div><br></div>