[tz] Ambiguous abbreviations for Australian timezones when daylight savings is in affect [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

[Tim Parenti]

On 7 April 2013 22:16, David Patte ₯ <dpatte at relativedata.com> wrote:

> True, but what we will provide is a proposal which also provides similiar
> changes to the central, western, Lord Howe and Eucla zones, where
> appropriate.


Don't forget Antarctica/Casey and Antarctica/Macquarie in the antarctica
file, as well.  At any time that those zones observed an Australia-based
time, their abbreviations should be handled consistently with the rest of
Australia.

On 7 April 2013 21:53, David Patte ₯ <dpatte at relativedata.com> wrote:

>
> It is not difficult to produce a patch which changes the abbreviations
> back to the time of original implementation of Daylight Saving time, but
> I'd prefer to get a concensus as to when the D/S abbreviations came into
> more promenant usage, if indeed the D/D abbreviations were ever more
> commonly used.


I think trying to go that route would end up sowing somewhat more confusion
than that which the patch aims to avoid, since "S" would mean two things
before a certain date, but only one thing after that date.  Not to mention
that such a date would be impossible to pin down, for the same reason the
broader discussion on these abbreviations has occurred (opinions here vary
from "it's already happened" to "it hasn't happened" to "it's
irrelevant").  Either make the change for all years, or don't make it at
all.

On 7 April 2013 21:19, David Patte ₯ <dpatte at relativedata.com> wrote:

> We will submit the patch to the list for review, and hope it is
> implemented. But if it is not, we have decided to fork tz and provide a new
> distribution with the new abbreviations applied.


I sincerely hope that it doesn't come to a fork and that the patch will be
accepted.  It seems to me that, despite a still-vocal minority, we have a
significantly clearer consensus on this matter now than we did even a year
ago.  Hopefully, the coordinator(s) recognize this and we can remain a
unified project despite differing opinions.

For the record, it is my preference to proceed with the AxST/AxDT format.
Australia/Eucla would then become ACWST/ACWDT for consistency with its
neighbors.  I feel that for Australia/Lord_Howe, LHST being quite unique
already would mean that LHST/LHDT could be used without the A, but others
may disagree.

--
Tim Parenti
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