[tz] *Off topic* A little respect ...

Paul.Koning at dell.com Paul.Koning at dell.com
Mon Jun 24 21:19:20 UTC 2019



> On Jun 23, 2019, at 7:31 AM, Chris Woodbury via tz <tz at iana.org> wrote:
> 
> ...
> It was, as has been explained, to reflect the technical "reality on the ground".
> I'm sorry if that displeased you but it is what it is.  Being obstreperous
> isn't going to change anything (except by further expanding the misery).
> Making us out to be tools of injustice doesn't make it so.
> 
> Note that the *country codes* that came into question have been patched
> reasonably expeditiously by Dr. Eggert.  TZ will reflect reality as best it can
> under the circumstances with or without anyone's complete satisfaction.

I wonder if it would be helpful to discuss this more explicitly in the THEORY file.  For example:

---
The goal of the TZ database is to reflect "reality on the ground" in each region.  It makes no judgment about the legal or diplomatic status of any administration in any region.  

TZ rules may be marked with the name of a place, and any other place that uses the same rule at a given point in time may then also refer to that rule by this name.  Such a marking has nothing to do with any political question.
---

This might make it a bit more explicit that the questions just raised are out of scope, and allows them to be dismissed with a reference to a written policy.  We already do this for zone names.  Not that it stops the issue from being brought up over and over, but at least it offers a quick way to answer them.

	paul


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