This year, Daylight Saving Time begins in the United States this weekend. You’re probably ready, now that you know about it, but your computer probably isn’t.
Back in 2005, Congress passed and President Bush signed the so-called Energy Policy Act of 2005, which changes daylight saving time in the U.S. to the second Sunday in March to the first Sunday in November, adding four weeks.
The lame excuse given was that it would help save energy, and Congress said it would consider switching back if the extended Daylight Saving Time failed to show any energy savings.
It won’t, of course, because there is no energy savings from setting the clocks ahead.
In the meantime, though, IT professionals are preparing for a computer and network meltdown as computer programs and embedded hardware such as Internet routers which aren’t yet able to recognize the change get confused. Shades of Y2K, perhaps. There isn’t much you can do about that, except to ensure that your own computer is up to date.
If you have Linux or Mac OS X, this is easy; the updates came out a year and a half ago, just days after the bill passed, they have been rolled into the operating system distributions since, and you almost certainly have them already. Linux users can check your system for a “tzdata” package numbered 2006m or later for full coverage of all affected countries (Canada and several Caribbean islands are coming along as well).
If you have Windows, it’s a different story altogether. Microsoft is not providing time zone updates for Windows 2000 and earlier operating systems. The time zone update is already included with Windows Vista, but Windows XP users may have to download the time zone update manually, after updating to Service Pack 2. Since the update is inexplicably not marked as “critical,” it may not be included in automatic updates. And if you use Microsoft Outlook, you have to download a separate update for it.
If you are unlucky enough to still be running Windows 2000, ME or 98, then unofficial patches are available to keep your computer’s clock in sync with the daylight saving time changes.
What a mess for you poor, poor Windows users.
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Jack Kuretzky
Mar 08, 2007
Please advise how to change time on computer
Michael Hampton
Mar 08, 2007
I already did. That’s what all that stuff above is. But you have to actually read it!
defrag
Mar 08, 2007
ubuntu ftw!
Rob Davidson
Mar 09, 2007
Sounds like “much ado about nothing” to me. My Windows machines (XP at home, 2000 at work) downloaded the Microsoft patches automatically. Even if they didn’t, somehow I think I could manage to still figure out what time it is for a couple of weeks (even assuming that I’m too dopey to reset the clock manually.)
I do love the way the media keeps hyping this, trying to make this sound like an impending disaster. You’d think that planes are going to start dropping out of the skies, or that “Skynet” is going to start killing all humans. ;D
I don’t use Outlook, but I’m curious about why it would require a seperate patch. Does Outlook maintain it’s own clock, as opposed to using the system time from your computer?
Billy
Mar 09, 2007
The problem is with the calendar functions. Any appointment scheduled before the change in rules was made will be off by an hour. The outlook patch (which must be installed *after* the sysem patch) goes through the affected period, and adjusts the times on meetings scheduled incorrectly, so that they are correct.
-billy-
Alexander
Mar 09, 2007
To assist your readers in Daylight Saving Time transition period, and as an ongoing time reference, I wanted to introduce you to a free online Web resource:WorldTimeZone.com
WorldTimeZone.com constantly monitors and tracks time
changes by country and integrates the information on a regular basis.
Jason
Mar 09, 2007
I’ve been working on this issue for the past week. Hitting every last single computer we have, lugging around a keyboard, mouse, and monitor, in case it is headless, and making SURE it won’t have a problem.
Lynn
Mar 10, 2007
Thanks, just checked and my XP auto-updated already. I’m of the opinion this is another excellent example of research done by the Bush administration. Using an outdated data set to claim energy savings? As if I won’t have to leave my lights on longer in the morning won’t erase any savings of lights on shorter in the evening? And how can this be saving so many barrels of oil when most electric-generating plants DON’T USE OIL TO GENERATE ELECTRICITY? I appreciate your commentaries immensely.
Rob Davidson
Mar 12, 2007
Thanks for the explanation, Billy. As soon as I read it I thought, “Well of course,” but I never use Outlook or schedule meetings (when people need me, they just come to my office), so that never occurred to me.
The funniest thing about all this fuss today was discovering that we’ve all been had. I’ve always accepted the “official” explanation that DST is necessary to save energy and that no less a genius than Benjamin Franklin himself first proposed it. It always seemed a bit silly to me, but I just thought, “If Franklin proposed it I guess it makes sense” and dismissed my doubts.
Then I read Christopher M. Montalbano’s column, “Time Out of Mind,” on LewRockwell.com today, and learned the truth. It was the first time I have ever actually seen Dr. Franklin’s “proposal.” It’s priceless; Franklin could yank your chain every bit as well as The Onion. Old Ben had a very wry sense of humor, and the biggest joke is that someone actually took him seriously and then got the rest of us to go along!
Ben Franklin was the KING of the practical joke!