Daylight Savings Time Change - 2008

[Marc]

Daylight Savings Time Change - 2008

Many countries are transitioning from their Daylight Savings period for 2008. This often causes confusion with end-users on forums because their time zone as reflected by vBulletin will change when they view the forums. The actual difference from GMT doesn't change.

The confusion is cause by how Daylight Savings is applied. When Daylight Savings goes into affect in the Spring, the clocks are moved ahead one hour. This effectively changes your timezone by one hour as well. GMT will always remain the zero meridian and doesn't change because of political time manipulations like this. In the fall, you move the clock back one hour or effectively gain an hour for timezone purposes. This reversal puts the clocks back on Standard Time.

Standard Timezones are calculated for periods where Daylight Savings Time is not in affect or the winter months. Also please note that Southern Hemisphere countries are the opposite of their Northern Hemisphere counterparts. While most of the world's population is leaving Daylight Savings Time this time of the year, those in the Southern Hemisphere are just entering it.

Some examples:
Los Angeles - Standard Time is GMT -8. Daylight Savings is GMT -7.
New York - Standard Time is GMT -5. Daylight Savings is GMT-4.
London - Standard Time is GMT. Daylight Savings is GMT +1.
Sydney - Standard Time is GMT +10, Daylight Savings is GMT +11.
Dubai - Standard Time is GMT +4, Daylight Savings is not Observed.

To see which countries observe Daylight Savings Time and when the times switch for this season please look at:
http://www.timeanddate.com/time/dst2008.html

Each registered visitor here does have a Daylight Savings Time setting. See your Options settings.

[Marty50]

Sometimes I think I live in one of the oddest places on earth.

We have just switched into the third year of a three year trial of daylight saving. Next year there will be a referendum by our State Government to see if its taken on permanently.

We have had four referendums over the last fifteen years where introduction of daylights saving has been rejected by the population who believe their carpets and curtains will fade and cows will no longer give milk *grin*

This has so divided our community and dominated our local politics to the detriment of more important issues. Does this happen all over the world?

[harry]

We had ours permanently advanced by one hour some twenty over years back. No issues so far except that youngsters like my twenty year old daughter kept wondering what's wrong when they come across calculations that kept showing an hour difference or when they try to synchronize time while using things like astronomy charts or softwares.

[Valeri]

Originally Posted by Marty50

Sometimes I think I live in one of the oddest places on earth.

We have just switched into the third year of a three year trial of daylight saving. Next year there will be a referendum by our State Government to see if its taken on permanently.

We have had four referendums over the last fifteen years where introduction of daylights saving has been rejected by the population who believe their carpets and curtains will fade and cows will no longer give milk *grin*

This has so divided our community and dominated our local politics to the detriment of more important issues. Does this happen all over the world?

Marty,

Be assured it does. We in Indiana had a strange problem as some of our counties were on Eastern standard and some on Central standard and travelers had no clue what time it was.

Anyway, we went back to daylight savings time this year (they got rid of it in the early 70's if memory servers) and it has very much divided the state.

My biggest worry is that the kids in my neighborhood are waiting for the school bus in the dark for most of the school year; further, the school crossing guards now work in the dark with flasher signs. This is way too dangerous.

Even with street lights, I don't walk or bicycle in the mornings anymore due to it being so very dark. Unfortunately, it is what it is.

[bobdoering]

I would rather change the clock every month to have the sun set at 9 PM I love having some time with sun after work. It doesn't bother me so much that the sun would rise at noon.

(Yes, for those of you closer to the pole, that might be an issue. It is a self-reference criterion thing.)