[tz] Urumqi timezone.

[Brian Inglis]

On 2017-04-12 23:17, gfb hjjhjh wrote:
> 2017-04-13 6:51 GMT+08:00 Brian Inglis:
>> On 2017-04-12 16:00, gfb hjjhjh wrote:
>>> ​As there are two different timmezones being used in Xinjiang, China,
>>> would it be a good idea to create another timezone named something
>>> like Asia/Urumqi2 to correspond to the different timezone being used
>>> in the area?
>> If the UI or device you are using does not offer the choice,
>> contact their support for workarounds or alternatives.
> ​But a problem with the current approach is that when some products 
> opt to use geolocation-based timezone selection, users of UTC+8 
> timezone in the area that are not aware of the existence of UTC+6 
> timezone could be confused by why their gadgets would automatically 
> get switched into UTC+6, as exampled by public reaction after one 
> such iOS update. Ultimately that would make most manufacturer
> default the timezone for Xinjiang to UTC+8 instead since UTC+6-users
> are more aware of the situation and thus less likely to be confused.

That may be the correct decision for such situations. 
There are other time zone enclaves where the time zone usage varies 
depending on both location and whether an organization follows local 
or official time e.g. where the Navajo nation in Arizona, USA crosses 
state lines and observes DST as do adjacent states, but Arizona does 
not use DST, although national or federal offices in the state may 
observe DST if their headquarters or offices in nearby states also 
do so.

It is up to third parties to decide how they use the time zone info 
provided. 
Making selections without allowing for *any* user input is probably 
not a wise approach. 
Workarounds or alternatives should be provided to correct 
inappropriate selections. 
You should contact those third parties if you disagree with their 
decisions. 

The provided tzselect script shows how it can be done easily and 
properly, and supports providing geolocation coordinates: see 
"man 8 tzselect" or run "tzselect --help" e.g.
zone.tab gives the following location for Urumqi:
	CN     +4348+08735     Asia/Urumqi     Xinjiang Time 
and running "tzselect -c +4348+08735" displays the alternatives:
Please identify a location so that time zone rules can be set correctly.
Please select one of the following time zone regions,
listed roughly in increasing order of distance from +4348+08735.
 1) China - Xinjiang Time
 2) Mongolia - Bayan-Ölgii, Govi-Altai, Hovd, Uvs, Zavkhan
 3) Russia - MSK+04 - Kemerovo
 4) Russia - MSK+04 - Altai
 5) Russia - MSK+04 - Tomsk
 6) Russia - MSK+04 - Novosibirsk
 7) Kazakhstan - Kazakhstan (most areas)
 8) Russia - MSK+04 - Krasnoyarsk area
 9) Nepal
10) Bhutan

Some third parties may not use this data or code, may choose to 
use only selected data or code, or not provide workarounds or 
alternatives for inappropriate selections. 

For example, satellite or cellular mobile phone service operators 
may only provide the time set on their towers or base stations, 
and handset platforms may be unable to provide alternatives. 
Time switching between zones is apparently fairly common when 
there are towers on both sides of nearby time zone boundaries. 
Options are sometimes provided to ignore "network" time and 
manually select the time (zone) to be displayed for this reason. 

-- 
Take care. Thanks, Brian Inglis, Calgary, Alberta, Canada