Time zone puzzle
 

Is it possible that applications can somehow fail to use the PC's time
zone correctly? Or for that to be over-ruled by a BIOS facility?

My time zone is (UTC+OO:00) Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London. And I
have never changed it. But I'm baffled by an obscure problem with my
mapping program, Memory-Map, which I'd regarded as a bug. In short, when
I open any GPX file of a GPS recording made in the summer, two problems
arise:

1. It displays the time one hour earlier than the correct time. IOW it
displays the first trackpoint of a July walk that started at 09:00 as
08:00.

2. When I save the GPX it subtracts another hour from all the time
stamps.

My version of Mem-Map is about 5 years old and Mem-Map support are
unable to reproduce the problem on a current version.

The obvious conclusion would be that it is indeed a bug in this old
version, but two things are prompting me to challenge that:

- I don't recall recognising this problem the last time I did similar
intensive work with GPX files, maybe a year ago (and many times before
that).

- Googling has got me suspecting Win 10 and/or my BIOS. Mostly stuff
that's technically over my head. Mem-Map's behaviour is naturally
critically dependent on the PC's time zone. Although Date/Time has been
constantly displayed correctly in the tray, could some lower level
function have interfered/corrupted in some way?

Win 10 here is currently at Version 1709 (OS Build 16299.309)

Any insights would be much appreciated please.

Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Time zone puzzle
 

Terry Pinnell wrote:

Is it possible that applications can somehow fail to use the PC's time
zone correctly?

Programmers can make a million mistakes with handling of time, rather
than using standard libraries to help them, it sounds like in the case
of memory-map that they may have assumed the time zone from the time the
file was created will be the same as the time zone now.

Time zone puzzle
 

On Fri, 16 Mar 2018 18:04:04 +0000, Terry Pinnell wrote:

Is it possible that applications can somehow fail to use the PC's time
zone correctly? Or for that to be over-ruled by a BIOS facility?

My time zone is (UTC+OO:00) Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London. And I
have never changed it. But I'm baffled by an obscure problem with my
mapping program, Memory-Map, which I'd regarded as a bug. In short, when
I open any GPX file of a GPS recording made in the summer, two problems
arise:

1. It displays the time one hour earlier than the correct time. IOW it
displays the first trackpoint of a July walk that started at 09:00 as
08:00.


Seems it assumes DST was in effect at that time.

Time zone puzzle
 

On 16/03/2018 21:39, ray carter wrote:
On Fri, 16 Mar 2018 18:04:04 +0000, Terry Pinnell wrote:

Is it possible that applications can somehow fail to use the PC's time
zone correctly? Or for that to be over-ruled by a BIOS facility?

My time zone is (UTC+OO:00) Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London. And I
have never changed it. But I'm baffled by an obscure problem with my
mapping program, Memory-Map, which I'd regarded as a bug. In short, when
I open any GPX file of a GPS recording made in the summer, two problems
arise:

1. It displays the time one hour earlier than the correct time. IOW it
displays the first trackpoint of a July walk that started at 09:00 as
08:00.

Seems it assumes DST was in effect at that time.

IOW the OP should wait until 25th March when UK starts its Summer Time!!

We get all sorts here worried about almost everything. The OP should
spend some time (if he/she is bored with life) scanning not only his
brain but his machine as well using Microsoft's State of the Art
Anti-Virus App. Link below.



/--- This email has been checked for viruses by
Windows Defender software.
//https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/comprehensive-security/


--
With over 600 million devices now running Windows 10, customer
satisfaction is higher than any previous version of windows.

Time zone puzzle
 

On Fri, 16 Mar 2018 18:04:04 +0000, Terry Pinnell
wrote:

Is it possible that applications can somehow fail to use the PC's time
zone correctly? Or for that to be over-ruled by a BIOS facility?

My time zone is (UTC+OO:00) Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London. And I
have never changed it. But I'm baffled by an obscure problem with my
mapping program, Memory-Map, which I'd regarded as a bug. In short, when
I open any GPX file of a GPS recording made in the summer, two problems
arise:

1. It displays the time one hour earlier than the correct time. IOW it
displays the first trackpoint of a July walk that started at 09:00 as
08:00.

2. When I save the GPX it subtracts another hour from all the time
stamps.

My version of Mem-Map is about 5 years old and Mem-Map support are
unable to reproduce the problem on a current version.

The obvious conclusion would be that it is indeed a bug in this old
version, but two things are prompting me to challenge that:

- I don't recall recognising this problem the last time I did similar
intensive work with GPX files, maybe a year ago (and many times before
that).

- Googling has got me suspecting Win 10 and/or my BIOS. Mostly stuff
that's technically over my head. Mem-Map's behaviour is naturally
critically dependent on the PC's time zone. Although Date/Time has been
constantly displayed correctly in the tray, could some lower level
function have interfered/corrupted in some way?

Win 10 here is currently at Version 1709 (OS Build 16299.309)

Any insights would be much appreciated please.

Terry, East Grinstead, UK


I suppose we have to live with time zones, but the Summer
time/Daylight saving contrivance is the work of Satan.

We will never know (ie it is suppressed) how many people die because
facility impairment due to di-annual jet-lagging.

And how many (also suppressed) injuries caused by the unfortunate who
fall off ladders adjusting clocks twice a year.

And how many (suppressed too) road crashes caused by having to drive
into the rising/setting sun not once but twice a year.

And how many expensive mistakes caused by not accounting for the
contrivance.

And then there are our bowels that have to make some sort of internal
adjustment...!!

Too few nations refuse to get involved with the clock-adjustment
nonsense. Yet there are some.

Time zone puzzle
 

ray carter wrote:

On Fri, 16 Mar 2018 18:04:04 +0000, Terry Pinnell wrote:

Is it possible that applications can somehow fail to use the PC's time
zone correctly? Or for that to be over-ruled by a BIOS facility?

My time zone is (UTC+OO:00) Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London. And I
have never changed it. But I'm baffled by an obscure problem with my
mapping program, Memory-Map, which I'd regarded as a bug. In short, when
I open any GPX file of a GPS recording made in the summer, two problems
arise:

1. It displays the time one hour earlier than the correct time. IOW it
displays the first trackpoint of a July walk that started at 09:00 as
08:00.


Seems it assumes DST was in effect at that time.

Agreed, but can I rule out any other cause apart from a bug in
Memory-Map itself?

Terry, East Grinstead, UK

Time zone puzzle
 

On Fri, 16 Mar 2018 21:49:10 +0000, Good Guy wrote:

On 16/03/2018 21:39, ray carter wrote:
On Fri, 16 Mar 2018 18:04:04 +0000, Terry Pinnell wrote:

Is it possible that applications can somehow fail to use the PC's time
zone correctly? Or for that to be over-ruled by a BIOS facility?

My time zone is (UTC+OO:00) Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London. And I
have never changed it. But I'm baffled by an obscure problem with my
mapping program, Memory-Map, which I'd regarded as a bug. In short,
when I open any GPX file of a GPS recording made in the summer, two
problems arise:

1. It displays the time one hour earlier than the correct time. IOW it
displays the first trackpoint of a July walk that started at 09:00 as
08:00.

Seems it assumes DST was in effect at that time.

IOW the OP should wait until 25th March when UK starts its Summer Time!!

We get all sorts here worried about almost everything. The OP should
spend some time (if he/she is bored with life) scanning not only his
brain but his machine as well using Microsoft's State of the Art
Anti-Virus App. Link below.

You were told to go away, why are you still posting.

Time zone puzzle
 

On Fri, 16 Mar 2018 21:33:29 -0400, Wolf K
wrote:

On 2018-03-16 18:40, Peter Jason wrote:
[...]
We will never know (ie it is suppressed) how many people die because
facility impairment due to di-annual jet-lagging.
[...]

NEJM published a paper about that:

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056...99604043341416

Enough reason to abolish it IMO.

More than enough. Half of Oz does very well without it and I ignore
it for some devices like CCTV, dashcams & camera-date settings.

It was introduced by venal stupid politicians to give the idle poor
still more time to flash their credit cards at coffee shops and
consumer-junk stores.

Best solution would be to shift all time zones by 1/2 hour, permanently.
Except the ones that are already a 1/2 hour off. Or go to a single time
zone Earth-wide, as Sir Sanford Fleming originally proposed.

Have a good (DST) day.

Time zone puzzle
 

On Sat, 17 Mar 2018 23:08:57 -0400, Wolf K
wrote:

On 2018-03-17 19:59, Peter Jason wrote:
[...]
It was introduced by venal stupid politicians to give the idle poor
still more time to flash their credit cards at coffee shops and
consumer-junk stores.
[...]

Actually, it was to extend golfing hours.



I don't know whether you mean that as a joke or it's true, but it
makes sense to me. As far as I'm concerned, DST would be more valuable
in the winter, when it gets dark earlier, than in the summer.

Time zone puzzle
 

"Ken Blake" wrote

| I don't know whether you mean that as a joke or it's true, but it
| makes sense to me. As far as I'm concerned, DST would be more valuable
| in the winter, when it gets dark earlier, than in the summer.
|

In a way that's true, but it also means getting
up in the dark, and maybe kids going to school
in the dark.

In Boston, where I live, it starts to get light in the
Winter around 7AM and dark a little after 4 PM.
In Summer it's 4:30AM and 8:30 PM. And that's
with DST. Without it we'd have 3:30 and 7:30.
We're on the eastern side of an oversized time zone.
So DST is a big help. For awhile we had it year
-round, but people complained about it being
dangerous for kids to walk to school in the dark.

What we really need is to enter the Atlantic
time zone AND have DST in the Summer.

Someone in Indiana may have daylight until after
9:30 PM during Summer with DST. I'd prefer that.
I certainly wouldn't notice that it was dark all the
way until 5:30 AM. :)

It all depends on your latitude and where you
are in a time zone. The closer to the equator, the
less it matters. And it depends on what your personal
schedule is like.

In any case, I think this is what's known as the
effete level of 1st-world problems.

Time zone puzzle
 

On 03/18/2018 04:35 PM, Wolf K wrote:

[snip]

In any case, I agree DST is a silly idea, and was so from the very
beginning. As the apocryphal Wise Old Sioux Chief said: "Only white man
would believe that cutting off top of blanket and sewing it on bottom
will make blanket longer."

Best,

I heard the blanket story in school, and remember it whenever I have to
deal with DST. That pretty well shows how it can't possibly be doing
what people claim (adding an extra hour of daylight). People often don't
think about stuff they're told.

BTW, when I needed to write a comment in the code for my webpage, what I
thought of was Damn Stupid Time (considering the way it really
complicates things, including creating a 25-hour day if you go by the
clock).

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"We have at last ascertained that miracles can be perfectly understood;
that there is nothing mysterious about them; that they are simply
transparent falsehoods." -- Robert Ingersoll

Time zone puzzle
 

"Wolf K" wrote

| Which is a reasonable suggestion. But instead of changing the clock
| permanently, we have the "solution" of twice yearly clock changes. To
| change the clock permanently, would require changing the definition of
| "noon" at Greenwich. That would never do!

| Sanford Fleming had the right idea: Have a single 24 hour clock
| worldwide, and just arrange local working hours to suit. Which is what
| we do anyhow.
|

I'm afraid this is the kind of thinking that results
from too much time spent with computers, trying
to make the world fit into a linear, logical framework.
That only works for linear, logical things. If you
kiss a woman you share millions of germs. So what's
the solution? Use a plastic sheet barrier? Both
gargle first with hydrogen peroxide solution? Stop
doing illogical things like kissing? Come to think of it,
why do you want to kiss a woman? It's a question
outside the tiny realm of logical analysis.

Somehow that kind of reasoning never seems to
hit the nail on the head. :)

Your Indian chief never had a set time to go
to work or to quit work. That doesn't make him wise.
Just different.

Of course, you could get rid of clocks. Let's do
that. Then you can just plan to go to work every
day at sunrise and quit at sunset. You can live like
your Indian chief. That's actually how it used to be
for farmers and laborers, not so long ago, with
workdays as long as 14 hours in the Summer. It's
probably still like that for farmers, with long days
in the Summer and semi-hibernation in the Winter.
Wouldja like that?

But the original complaint was that you don't
want to have to keep changing your habits, a
grueling two times per year, to accomodate DST.
Imagine how much adaptation you'll have to make
if you live by Nature's schedule.

It turns out that life is a thoroughly unreasonable,
irrational predicament that requires constant adaptation.
Who knew? :)

Time zone puzzle
 

"Wolf K" wrote

| What caused me to detest DST was the discovery that the clock
| change causes a spike in accidents (and deaths) on the highways

I'm not sure I believe that. It sounds farfetched
to me. Perhaps trumped-up research from anti-DST
groups. All the accidents that I or friends have been
in over the past few years have been caused by
drivers using cellphones. My ladyfriend got hit just a
few weeks ago. A young woman runing a red light
while talking on the phone. I've been in 2 serious
accidents over the past 15 years. With one I know the
driver was on the phone. I saw him. Then he veered
into my lane due to not paying attention. With the
other I'm not certain. But it was a young man who
simply plowed into my parked pickup, on a quiet
one-way street, hitting it so hard it popped up onto
the curb and broke the axle. He was amazed that he'd
hit something.

Yet in my state we still can't get the legislature
to pass a no-handhelds-while-driving law.