LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Toby Corkindale <tjcorkin@steadycom.com.au>
  To  : Linux SA <linuxsa@linuxsa.org.au>
  Date: Tue, 02 Nov 1999 14:10:40 +1030

Re: Daylight Savings Time

Yes, but standardisation isn't neccessarily a good thing.
Different circumstances require different optimisations.
From a linux point of view, you COULD make a kernel that has everything
compiled into it, compiled without any 486 or better options, and then
everyone could use it....But would you want to?
We know that it's better to just have the features you need, compiled
for your particular processor.
The same goes for times, perhaps.

It's handy to know that no matter where you are in the world, it's
usually dark at 0000, and usually lunch time by 1200, for instance.
Imagine if you had to go and look up a guidebook just to find out what
hours your local shops were open at?
(Adelaide, eastern suburbs 1318.56 to 2148.56, and western suburbs
1315.34 to 2145.34 for example)

Toby

David Drury wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> > The technology is becoming available to allow us to use sidereal time so why
> > don't we?  We adapt to ludicrously large time discrepancies imposed by time
> > zones created around political boundaries which from a scientific viewpoint
> > are quite arbitrary (and mobile in some cases).
> 
> Partly because of business. Thats why we every so often get the option of
> going to Eastern Standard Time, there's something to be said for ringing
> businesses interstate and getting them in the same hours you work
> (particularly tech support lines). Half an hour isn't too bad. Imagine
> what would happen across SA if time varied. It'd make communication by
> phone dificult.
> 
> Its hard enough trying to ring my sister in Darwin some times with an
> hours difference.
> 
> > We could either go to a universal time for convenience or sidereal time for
> > purity but the current system is total bull$hit.
> 
> Would you propose we then work to US working hours under universal time ?
> Sure computers can handle time zones fine in any way you program them
> (given any arbitrary Mean Time), but humans don't.
> 
> > Surely an orderly society would use one time standard and speak one language
> > and use just one LINUX kernel at any given time.  I guess GMT will never be
> > used universally since the Poms just aren't the force that they used to be.
> 
> But human's will never be truly universal. Just look at our world:
> 
> English is standard language of comerce because of Britain and US, but we
> use a French standard of measurements not followed by either country. All
> places will still follow their languages, and even if we did standardise,
> we'd still have dialects and slang. We have 4 (to my knowledge) standards
> of video (PAL, NTSC, SECAM, MeSECAM), 6 Zones for DVD, US has chosen a
> different standard for Mobile Phones, Japan has 2.5" floppy disks that fit
> in an envelope, even Australia can't agree on what type of republic we
> want to be ! Even look at the number of "Linuxes" out there ! Not everyone
> runs the same kernel version !
> 
> Can you imagine the world agreeing on a standard for time, or units ?
> 
> --
> David Drury
> 
>    _______________________________________
>    \ iddrury@teaching.cs.adelaide.edu.au  \
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> 
> --
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