[LEAPSECS] Multi-timezone meetings

[Rob Seaman]

Tony Finch wrote:


> Rob Seaman wrote:

> 

>> Virtually all of our meetings take place in more than one place since we

>> have sites in Arizona and Chile, Corporate HQ in DC, partners in

>> California and Hawaii (and a dozen other places).  I imagine this is not

>> atypical these days.  Scheduling changes are needed when DST kicks in in

>> the U.S. (though not in Arizona) and six months (give or take) out of

>> sync in Chile.

> 

> The way to deal with multi-location metings is to choose a primary

> location, then it it obvious what will happen when TZ rules change.


Interesting.  Immediately after that I said:


>> Whatever our individual positions on the issues, they will be better served by collecting complete and accurate use cases and engineering requirements.



I was describing aspects of the problem space and neither discussed, nor asked advice on, the various solutions we may have implemented.

The response was to attempt to minimize the implications (rather neutral to talking points on this list other than giving cover to the devil-may-care timezone roulette notion) by suggesting a "right way" to implement an "obvious" solution.

A few other aspects of the problem space:

	1) The conference rooms have multiple clocks on the walls for each major location.  Attempts to deploy clocks that automatically adjust to DST changes have failed since 1) the rules changed after the clocks were programmed, and 2) the only clocks available that support U.S. time signals don't support for example the Chilean timezone (UTC-4).

	2) Scheduling software does a pretty good job of supporting the range of timezones and DST rules (presumably layered on Olson), except for educating the users who often forget during  changeover that Arizona and Hawaii, in particular for our community, don't observe DST.

	3) There rarely is a "primary location".  Attempting to assert one would have political ramifications.

	4) Most meetings involve three or more timezones.  Certain hours of the day are highly desirable because they are convenient for most or all sites.  Others are highly undesirable due to conflicts with local lunchtimes, etc.

	5) Again, please note that only 10-15% of the world observes any type of daylight saving time.

Timezones, as with time in general, appear simple on the surface.

Rob