[tz] Moving more zones to 'backzone'

[Steffen Nurpmeso]

Robert Elz wrote in
 <10948.1660601685 at jacaranda.noi.kre.to>:
 |    Date:        Mon, 15 Aug 2022 13:45:20 -0700
 |    From:        Paul Eggert <eggert at cs.ucla.edu>
 |    Message-ID:  <d841baed-8aa1-708f-f653-3e409ddb93f8 at cs.ucla.edu>
 ...
 |This database of historical local time information has several goals:
 |
 | * Provide a compendium of data about the history of civil time that
 |   is useful even if not 100% accurate.

What i do not understand is that: if the latter is true, then why
do you all not simply include backzone, and be fine with it?

It surely is the best there is, and the one or two entries
which seem ambiguous because different sources claim different
things (or the same source does so), one had be chosen to be
included.  That is all there can be done about that.  And post
1970 it makes no difference.  End of the story.

 | * Give an idea of the variety of local time rules that have existed
 |   in the past and thus may be expected in the future.
 |
 | * Test the generality of the local time rule description system.
 |
 |Those I think all remain important.    Eg: as now being distributed
 |Cambodia claims to have used UTC+0700 since 1921.   But that's not
 |what the old Asia/Phnom_Penh zone said, with timezone changes in the
 |WWII period.   Now the precise details of the changes listed might or
 |might not be correct, but pretending that no zone change happened at
 |all is much less correct (unless you have some evidence that's true,
 |which I doubt).

I think i spoke for Laos in 2014 when the first such change
happened.  I fail to see a difference in between Laos, Cambodia,
and what recently happened, except for skin colour and military
and economical power, thus also prerogative of interpretation.
("A thing like never before", maybe even.  To have it said.)

To have it said.  I would not have done it, but then it was done
and noone cared no more.  So it should be completed.  You can use
zone.tab instead of zone1970.tab with tzselect, unfortunately it
is an undocumented option.  Is this mischievous?
If you want it all, include backzone.  Change the default to
zone.tab, this is an easy packager decision.  They are both
installed in a default installation ever since, at your fingertip.

"We didn't start the fire, it was always burning."  You are
concerned, you are an expert maintainer, do these two things.  If
i look around what packagers do to get their things done, local
patches and what not.  Packagers i do not understand at all.

Things are different for source consumers, they have a harder
time.  But -- the change was made in 2014!  This is eight years!
This is all you who happily agree with strange code of conducts,
changing master to main, black to block, white to allow, red to
green, yellow to spots in the snow, and what not.  No no.
Can't you source consumers simply generate the full tzdata.zi on
your local box, and write an awk script that turns that one into
an input file of your application?  Remove the rest of your
toolchain?  What is it that makes it so hard?  Now that at least
some of you provide their own tarball for TZ?

I really do not understand.

 || For example, despite recent events 
 || in Kosovo we haven't had to worry about creating a name like 
 || Europe/Pristina, and this is a win.
 |
 |I don't recall seeing anyone request one, which is one reason for
 |not creating it - but if they did, I believe you should.  I certainly
 |don't see failing to create it as any kind of win.
 |
 |I understand the argument - the guidelines say there is no need for
 |a new zone as the time has been the same as ... since at least 1970.
 |And you can claim that you're not making a political decision because
 |of that - though people in Kosovo might (one day) start complain that
 |you're a Russian/Serbian puppet, and are trying to pretend Kosovo doesn't
 |exist.

Others may say you seem to confuse cause and effect.
It is all very sensitive.

 |Now understand that I'm not claiming that my version of the guidelines
 |would make much difference in this area - but as Kosovo clearly has a
 |government, who are capable of choosing what timezone they're in (and as
 |not EU members, or not currently anyway, they're not even restricted by
 |EU policies), so under my proposal, they'd get a zone if they asked \
 |for one.
 |
 |Of course, to their opponents, that would mean that you're adopting the
 |Kosovo side of their dispute, you're just a US puppet, and proclaiming
 |that everything is biased against them.
 |
 |That is, there is no avoiding of political controversy here, act, don't
 |act, you're always going to anger the people who wanted the other decision.
 |
 |Or in other words, "avoiding political issues" simply doesn't work.
 |
 |What you're really saving is 15 minutes editing and testing now, and
 |deferring it to sometime later, when they decide to change their zone
 |rules, and a new zone is necessary, but at this point it becomes a
 |harder transition for everyone (everyone else anyway) as people who would
 |logically have been using Europe/Pristina (and could have switched to that
 |from whatever they have been using, whenever they felt inclined, since
 |both would have generated the same results - at least post 1970) would
 |then all have to switch in a hurry, to get the modified zone in time for
 |the change to take effect.   Not nice to inflict on people for no good \
 |reason.
 |
 |This is exactly the same as when you said that we won't tell people in
 |Sweden to switch to using Europe/Berlin (though that's effectively what
 |you are doing to them) so things are easier if they Sweden and Germany
 |separate their zones (like one keeping summer time, and the other not).
 |That's fine for the Swedes (though dropping their historical data is not),
 |but why are the people in Kosovo not afforded the same courtesy?
 |
 |kre
 --End of <10948.1660601685 at jacaranda.noi.kre.to>

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)