RE: With the upcoming time change....

Hi, Vern:

Thanks for your message.  That's fair at first glance.  So we're saying we
can't improve the operating system because we have vendor Business Partners
who have special considerations, and it's our duty to protect them, thereby
ensuring that they don't have opportunity to remove those special
considerations?  That's an interesting proposal indeed!

What if this was all *planned* and IBM were to state, "From VxRx forward,
the AS/400 will use GMT as its internal time of reference.  All times
presented to the user will be *local,* having been adjusted according to
the user-specified UTC offset *TABLE* which is DST-aware."  (This is not a
new concept... it's been on *nix systems, for example, for at least thirty
years.)  Now, if IBM were also to allow (say via API) an application to
reference GMT (and the table in some fashion), the BP in question would be
(or at least should be) able to work off of that internal clock, thereby
eliminating such special operations once and for all.  And what if (wonder
of wonders) the USER had the choice of specifying a fixed UTC-offset (ala
Indiana or China or ....), and would therefore be able to operate the tired
old way if s/he so chose?

As I read it, the thinking is "ApplicationX requires special steps in order
to accomodate DST.  In order that we don't disrupt things and take away
ApplicationX's need for those special steps once or twice every year, we
can't touch the code."  And we can't improve it for those who don't use
ApplicationX because ... umm ... because ...  Am I missing something?

Now that I've stuck my foot out there to be smashed, I'll have a look at
the archives and see what the discussion included.  But I'll tell you now
it'll be very hard to convince me that this sort of change isn't an
improvement that's well worth the effort.

I know that I'm way past "Everybody else has one, Mom.  Why can't I?" but
come on, IBM.

Dennis






Vern Hamberg <vhamberg@centerfieldtechnology.com>@midrange.com on
10/25/2002 08:05:58 AM

Please respond to midrange-l@midrange.com

Sent by:    midrange-l-admin@midrange.com


To:    midrange-l@midrange.com
cc:
Subject:    RE: With the upcoming time change....


Dennis

The matter of  "Daylight Savings Time awareness" was much discussed fairly
recently. I guess se didn't have much to do back in June  ;-)

The main issue, as I understand it, is time-dependent processes. ROBOT, for
one, should be shut down, then the change made, then restarted, so that you
don't either miss or double-run something.

Vern

At 07:40 AM 10/25/02 -0400, you wrote:

>This is one of the areas I find amusing about the AS/400 system.  It's
>amusing only because it's easily overcome and not really in the nuisance
>category.
>
>I am not aware of any other system where both UTC offset and local time
>must both be specified for proper operation (you only need one of these if
>the internal time is maintained at GMT)... and also aware of no other
>system that isn't "Daylight Savings Time aware."  (oh, I take that
back....
>IBM mainframes suffer from the same shortsightedness.  And DOS from back
>when the earth was still cooling.)
>
>I keep thinking that one day IBM will wake up and resolve this, but then
>what would I have to complain about two times every year?   Of course, I
>could always move back home to Indiana, where they don't bother with such
>nonsense.... hmmm....  :)
>
>Dennis

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