[tz] How long will the rearguard formats continue be provided?

[Mark Davis ☕️]

There will be major implementations using the rearguard format into the
indefinite future; billions more instances of OSs will use rearguard than
use non-rearguard. The non-rearguard causes significant compatibility
problems, and doesn't provide any additional functionality that would
offset those problems.

Mark


On Thu, Jan 24, 2019 at 3:32 AM Paul Eggert <eggert at cs.ucla.edu> wrote:

> On 1/23/19 2:40 PM, Pramoth Murali wrote:
> >
> > how long will these rearguard versions (with no negative offsets)
> > continue to be provided?
> >
> >
> There is no definite schedule for that, just as there is no definite
> schedule for anything associated with tzdb. It's a volunteer effort,
> after all.
>
> That being said, you needn't retrieve a rearguard-format tarball to get
> rearguard-format data. You can instead use the ordinary tarball, which
> comes bundled with software that will generate rearguard format upon
> request. Even if I stop my informal distribution of a rearguard-format
> tarball, you can still generate rearguard-format data from the standard
> distribution by running the command 'make rearguard.zi'.
>
> I also suggest boosting the priority of updating your custom version of
> tzcode so that it works the way ordinary tzcode works. tzcode's zic has
> supported negative offsets for decades, and it's time to catch up.
>
>
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