[tz] On ISO country for timezones (Re: Classifying IDs)

Clive D.W. Feather clive at davros.org
Fri Oct 8 15:02:46 UTC 2021


Stephen Colebourne via tz said:
> > Where does "the project" talk about deprecating IDs at all? Not in the
> > theory file.
> 
> There is a frequently expressed view that lots of IDs in tzdb only
> exist for backwards compatibility.

When ignoring pre-1970 data (as you asked to do earlier in this
discussion), that's right.

But that is not deprecating them. It is not saying that they will be
removed at some point in the future.

> It is pretty clear that means they
> are not considered to be part of the main API of the project.

When ignoring pre-1970 data.

These are "if we were building this from scratch with the current rules,
these wouldn't be needed" IDs. We only include them (when ignoring pre-1970
data) because of backwards compatibility. But I don't see anyone suggesting
we get rid of them.

> This has two effects - new IDs will not added when they should be

No, you can't say "should". You're inventing a rule and then trying to use
that to claim that others are breaking the rules. That's begging the
question.

-- 
Clive D.W. Feather          | If you lie to the compiler,
Email: clive at davros.org     | it will get its revenge.
Web: http://www.davros.org  |   - Henry Spencer
Mobile: +44 7973 377646


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