> I dislike TZ selectors that use locations (cities, countries, etc.). Let PDT be PDT(-8) and PST be PST(-7).

You can choose that. Set your timezone to Etc/GMT-8. Then, at the exact time your political jurisdiction mandates switching over to PST, go to all your computers and switch them all to Etc/GMT-7. Then do the same thing next year for switching back.

What? That's bad UX as well? Well then, you have to name the correct political jurisdiction that mandates the timezone rules where you live. And that's hard, because so many little tinkerers at state and municipal level decide to change the rules just for their little fiefdom. And they keep changing their minds.

The tz database is looking for the longest-lived identifier that accurately describes that geographic region to which the rules apply. Every time one region diverges from the norm, they need to accommodate the split. They chose continent and city names, because the historical perspective is that city names have remained in use longer than country names.

For your case, however, they have aliases. "US/Pacific" is an alias to America/Los_Angeles", as is "PST8PDT". Set and forget.

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Sophira 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

> For your case, however, they have aliases. "US/Pacific" is an alias to America/Los_Angeles", as is "PST8PDT". Set and forget.

Except when you can't forget, as in the original case for this blog post in the first place.

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dheera 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

> You can choose that. Set your timezone to Etc/GMT-8.

In the Debian installer yes, but the stupid Ubuntu installer forces you to pick from a map.

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mindslight 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

If the map let you pick any arbitrary point rather than having to pick a specific city in the TZ database, that would actually be a better way than a list of cities. See the discussion elsewhere in this thread about mapping Salt Lake City -> (Boise vs Denver).

(I don't think the TZ database contains the information to do this though, but maybe it should?)

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layer8 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Why would you use Ubuntu in the first place?

	▲	dheera 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		Because it works? Why wouldn't you?

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prmoustache 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

The good option is not to yell at clouds but to open a bug report, provide a patch, use Debian or change it after install.

	▲	dheera 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		I change it after install, but let's be realistic: I'm not Linus Torvalds or Guido von Rustum, it's not like they would listen to me or take my patch.