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From: smb@ulysses.UUCP (Steven Bellovin)
Newsgroups: net.news,net.mail
Subject: Re: Timezones For Worldwide Networks
Message-ID: <995@ulysses.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 23-Jun-85 21:34:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: ulysses.995
Posted: Sun Jun 23 21:34:42 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 24-Jun-85 06:23:14 EDT
References: <143@kddlab.UUCP> <4536@mit-eddie.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill
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Xref: watmath net.news:3477 net.mail:898

> >This example also show the designer did not consider UNIX systems
> >used outside the US, Europe, and Australia. 
> 
> And maybe he didn't get that right, either.  When we added Australian
> time zones to Multics we got the names from our Australian users, and
> they gave us EAST (Eastern Australian Summer (Standard?) Time, I think)
> and a bunch of other zones that don't look anything like the above.
> -- 

As I mentioned a few weeks ago, the original set of timezones in getdate() --
a routine written for different purposes entirely -- was taken from RFC733,
the nearest thing to an applicable standard there was at the time.  (733 was
the predecessor of RFC 822, the current mail standard.)  When other sites
joined the net, time zones were added -- yes, I did get the list of Australian
time zones from Australian users, and no, I don't know why your list was
different.

As for using JST in something to be transmitted -- I can't agree that that's
a good idea.  Nor is using Eastern Standard Time, or any other such -- if
a time is to be understood, it must be unambiguous and hence absolute -- i.e.,
GMT.  Let the local presentation software display it in any desired fashion,
if you wish; maybe even keep the local time in the header as a comment -- but
there is software that uses the "Date:" line, and trying to deal with all
of the world's timezones just doesn't work; they're ambiguously abbreviated
when looked at globally.  (And that says nothing of the problems in dealing
with Saudi Arabia, which -- according to the comments in ctime.c -- uses
solar time.....)