[tz] Introduce Etc/UTC+x timezones?

[Doug Ewell]

Benjamin Drung wrote:

> Thanks for all the feedback - especially the history lesson about GMT
> vs. UTC. As result I will just clarify the difference between GMT and
> UTC offsets in the Debian/Ubuntu package.

Crucially, the difference we have been talking about is not between “GMT offsets” and “UTC offsets” per se, or between GMT and UTC themselves. It is between two notational conventions, one which assigns positive values to time zones west of the prime meridian and another which assigns negative values to them.

There is history behind each of these competing decisions, but this is not a matter of “GMT vs. UTC,” and users who understand the actual relationship between GMT and UTC will only be confused by such a statement.

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Doug Ewell, CC, ALB | Lakewood, CO, US | ewellic.org