Timezone naming

[Paul Eggert]

   From: J Wunsch <j at uriah.heep.sax.de>
   Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 21:13:04 +0100 (MET)

   So why don't you value the opinion of the people living here more than
   the opinion of `foreigners'?

I value the opinion of all contributors.  In this case, the problem is
that some people use `CET' and some use `MET', and the question is
which abbreviation to prefer in the tz database.

   My strongest point is still that you're simply not mighty enough to
   change the world.

The real-world tradition prefers `CET' -- at least, that is what I
found when I looked into the issue, and I haven't seen much contrary
evidence though I would welcome it.  The question was whether to keep
the tz database's idiosyncratic `MET/MET DST' abbreviations, or to
switch to the real-world abbreviations.

I'm sorry to hear that the change is upsetting some users.  But the tz
database continues to support TZ='MET' for people who prefer the old
style.  And one is always free to edit the zoneinfo files to output
`DNT', `EMI', `EMT', `FWT', `HFH', `HOE', `ITA', `MET', `MEWT', `MEZ',
`NFT', `NOR', `SET', `SST', `SWT', or `WUT', all of which I have seen
listed as abbreviations for winter time for some locales in that time
zone.

I'm afraid that questions like these can never be completely resolved
to everybody's satisfaction.  Perhaps now's the time to start thinking
about a system for localizing the time zone abbreviations.  It would
be nice if this could be done to the tables without breaking existing
instances of `zic'.  Then e.g. German-speakers could easily see
`MEZ'/`MESZ', which are the preferred German abbreviations.