Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone • Hacker News Board

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#281

Post by akira2501 » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:48 PM UTC

gausswho wrote: post #121

Excellent read around the acrobatics of timezone software. It really is quite flexible. It leads me to wonder. If it's all just an automated and finite offset, there's no reason for daylight savings policies to hew to 60 minutes adjustments. Couldn't a nation decide to have a continuously changing offset throughout the year? It might make their offset lookup table substantially longer, but this could 'solve' daylight…

> It really is quite flexible.

Other than considering current legally defined timezones as "legacy" definitions and then removing them for no reason other than to follow European fashion.

So, flexible, but managed by inflexible university types.

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#282

Post by jmbwell » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:49 PM UTC

Those interested in this kind of pedantry might also take care to note that it’s called “daylight saving time,” with no “s.”

It is a system of time for saving daylight.

It is not a sales event promising “savings.”

Frustrating to read an otherwise excellent and detailed article that makes this error throughout.

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#283

Post by soperj » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:50 PM UTC

Lance_ET_Compte wrote: post #273

A thousand years ago, every village had their own timekeeping and it worked. Our village is now earth. What if we just abandoned daylight-savings time and timezones and just went with GMT (or anything else) for everywhere on earth? There would be cultural effects as people in California now start work at 16:00, for example...

I'd adjust to that better than adjusting to Daylight savings time.

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#284

Post by delecti » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:51 PM UTC

nerdponx wrote: post #249

nine_k wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is indeed a more logical clock, as it follows the natural cycle of activity. Equally, calendars that put the end of the year at the time after harvest ("autumn"), or at the start of agricultural work ("spring") are also more logical. Positioning the beginning of a new day at noon, and a new year t a solstice, is just a technical convenience, because these are easy to detect with very simple astronomy tools.

What makes it more logical? The wheel turns all the same no matter where you mark the beginning. In the Northern hemisphere, there's actually something nice about starting the year in the dead of winter: it feels like the year is born in the spring and then dies away the following winter, not unlike a lifetime.

> it feels like the year is born in the spring

Then shouldn't the start of the year be when the year is "born"? Or alternatively, the end of the year when the year "dies"? January 1 is neither.

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#285

Post by ianburrell » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:53 PM UTC

fermuch wrote: post #276

Lance_ET_Compte wrote: post #273

A thousand years ago, every village had their own timekeeping and it worked. Our village is now earth. What if we just abandoned daylight-savings time and timezones and just went with GMT (or anything else) for everywhere on earth? There would be cultural effects as people in California now start work at 16:00, for example...

Isn't that how china works? One timezone for everyone

That is good example why one timezone doesn't work. The locals in Xinjiang use a local time zone +6, instead of China time +8, because the latter is too far off the daylight hours.

My understanding is that use of Xinjiang time has dropped recently because of the crack down on Uygurs and government forcing China time.

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#286

Post by kccqzy » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:55 PM UTC

The most amusing tidbit about the tz database is that it contains an estimate of Big Bang, and it refuses to calculate timezone transitions occurring before the Big Bang.

The commit message at https://github.com/eggert/tz/commit/b22d459a367f4d01b10f6f6b... says:

> For example, Glib computes Sao Paulo time stamps as if Brazil's circa-1913 rules were still in effect. (Thanks to Leonardo Chiquitto for reporting the bug.) Work around the bug by not generating time stamps equal to -2**63. Come to think of it, time stamps before the Big Bang are physically suspect anyway, so don't generate time stamps before the Big Bang.

Soon afterwards, a separate commit disallowed leap seconds before the Big Bang.

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#287

Post by a57721 » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:57 PM UTC

fermuch wrote: post #276

Lance_ET_Compte wrote: post #273

A thousand years ago, every village had their own timekeeping and it worked. Our village is now earth. What if we just abandoned daylight-savings time and timezones and just went with GMT (or anything else) for everywhere on earth? There would be cultural effects as people in California now start work at 16:00, for example...

Isn't that how china works? One timezone for everyone

There are various countries that optimize the number of time zones for administrative purposes, but this is much easier and sensical to implement within one country than globally.

UTC is used globally when it makes sense, e.g. for the schedules of international radio broadcasts.

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#288

Post by mayneack » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:57 PM UTC

My personal favorite timezones:

There's UTC+14 in Micronesia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UTC%2B14:00

Also Antarctica/Troll: A timezone for a norwegian research station. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_Norway

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#289

Post by bakkoting » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 4:57 PM UTC

Lance_ET_Compte wrote: post #273

A thousand years ago, every village had their own timekeeping and it worked. Our village is now earth. What if we just abandoned daylight-savings time and timezones and just went with GMT (or anything else) for everywhere on earth? There would be cultural effects as people in California now start work at 16:00, for example...

Here's a good essay about that: So You Want To Abolish Time Zones [1]

[1] https://qntm.org/abolish

Re: Australia/Lord_Howe is the weirdest timezone

#290

Post by ianburrell » Wed, Oct 30, 2024, 5:01 PM UTC

Lance_ET_Compte wrote: post #273

A thousand years ago, every village had their own timekeeping and it worked. Our village is now earth. What if we just abandoned daylight-savings time and timezones and just went with GMT (or anything else) for everywhere on earth? There would be cultural effects as people in California now start work at 16:00, for example...

Everyone would create local time zones and use them. It is convenient to have the clock synchronized to the local day. Using UTC optimizes for long distances when people use local clocks much more often.

How do you handle the date changing in the middle of the day? If I was on UTC, the date would change at 5pm. Is that still Wednesday or would it be Thursday?

Also, it doesn't solve the problem since still need to figure out local time when interacting long distances. If need to keep track of local times, might as well use time zones.

Finally, can solve most of the problems with time zones by including UTC time with anything long distance. Say "meeting is at 4pm, 23:00 UTC", then nobody has to worry about your local time zone.