Daylight Savings Time, PHP/Mandrake Linux, March 2007. Options?

[sugapablo]

I have an old machine running Mandrake 9.2 and PHP 4.3.1 hosting
several websites.

With the coming changes to daylight savings time in March 2007, what
are my options in correcting the current calculation on this machine?

Ideal option: RPM patch.

Worst option: upgrade OS (it's a very old machine).

[Bit Twister]

On 16 Feb 2007 03:51:32 -0800, sugapablo wrote:

I have an old machine running Mandrake 9.2 and PHP 4.3.1 hosting
several websites.

Ye-ouch. I would be very afraid to be hosting websites with all the
security fixes you are missing, OS and PHP.

[C.]

On 16 Feb, 11:51, "sugapablo" <sugapa...@hotm ail.comwrote:

I have an old machine running Mandrake 9.2 and PHP 4.3.1 hosting
several websites.

With the coming changes to daylight savings time in March 2007, what
are my options in correcting the current calculation on this machine?

Ideal option: RPM patch.

Worst option: upgrade OS (it's a very old machine).

Normally, you shouldn't have to do anything provided your hardware
clock runs on GMT/UTC/Zulu and your TZ environment variable is
correctly configured.

BUT I suspect the real thrust of your question is what to do IF YOU
HAPPEN TO LIVE IN ONE OF THE COUNTRIES CHANGING WHEN DST STARTS/ENDS.

Apart from moving house or upgrading to a more recent distro, the only
real option is to upgrade your version of the timezones files. See
http://www.twinsun.com/tz/tz-link.htm for a description of the process
and how to get the raw data files.

C.

[Snowbat]

On Fri, 16 Feb 2007 03:51:32 -0800, sugapablo wrote:

I have an old machine running Mandrake 9.2 and PHP 4.3.1 hosting
several websites.

With the coming changes to daylight savings time in March 2007, what
are my options in correcting the current calculation on this machine?

Ideal option: RPM patch.

Worst option: upgrade OS (it's a very old machine).

Hey, my LAN server still runs Mandrake 9.1. I tried 2005LE on it but the
kernel doesn't like my hardware. I'll try an Ubuntu install one of these
days.

I presume your problem relates to this:
"The passage of the US Energy Policy Act of 2005 alters the Daylight
Saving Time (DST) start and end dates by four weeks. Several countries
(Canada, Bermuda) are also implementing the same DST change; other
countries may decide to make similar changes to DST rules. Beginning in
2007, DST start and end dates will be:

* Start date: Second Sunday of March (March 11)
* End date: First Sunday of November (November 4)"

urpmi timezone
The timezone package comes with a utility called zic, the time zone
compiler. Prepare a suitable text file in the correct format, process it
through zic, move the output to a location in /usr/share/zoneinfo/ and
then create a symlink at /etc/localtime that points to it.

Brazilian users need to do this every year as the DST change dates do not
follow a set pattern - they pick the dates every year.
http://www.alkalay.net/software/zoneinfo/Brazil.txt
^ Avi hasn't updated this for 2007 yet


--
--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

[RaMRod]

sugapablo wrote:

With the coming changes to daylight savings time in March 2007, what
are my options in correcting the current calculation on this machine?

Ahem, use ntp to synchronize your PC clock, perhaps ? Or is Mdk 9.2 not
aware of such wonders of technology ? Even dumb Windblows knows to
update time in accordance with the local DST policy.
--


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[Unruh]

RaMRod <id***@think.so writes:

>sugapablo wrote:

>With the coming changes to daylight savings time in March 2007, what
are my options in correcting the current calculation on this machine?

>Ahem, use ntp to synchronize your PC clock, perhaps ? Or is Mdk 9.2 not
aware of such wonders of technology ? Even dumb Windblows knows to
update time in accordance with the local DST policy.
--

Useless advice. ntp has nothing to do with DST. It will make sure that your
system clock is accurate to a few milliseconds but that is in UTC
(Universal Time Coordinate) which never suffers from DST. To translate from
that to your local time, you use the file /etc/localtime or the file
pointed to in zoneinfo by the TZ environment variable.

It has been posted here many times.
Get the file
tzdata2007a.tar .gz
from many places on the web
Go to the directory where you downloaded it
tar -xzf tzdata2007a.tar .gz
zic northamerica
rm /etc/localtime
cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Vancouver /etc/localtime
(or if you are unfortunate enough not to live in Vancouver, use the nearest
large city with the same timezone as you have)
That is it.
If you have a program which runs continuously and needs the correct local
time, restart that program. Otherwise sit back and enjoy

[Moe Trin]

On 16 Feb 2007, in the Usenet newsgroup alt.os.linux.ma ndriva, in article
<11************ **********@m58g 2000cwm.googleg roups.com>, sugapablo wrote:

>I have an old machine running Mandrake 9.2 and PHP 4.3.1 hosting
several websites.

Last maintained when? Support ended two years ago, and with all of the
exploits since then, I'd hate to have a system that old near a network.

>With the coming changes to daylight savings time in March 2007, what
are my options in correcting the current calculation on this machine?

Really, I would replace it with a modern distribution. IF YOU ABSOLUTELY
MUST retain it, then you have one sure option, and one possible.

1. Sure option:

ftp://elsie.nci.nih.gov/pub/tz*2007b.tar.gz

-rw-r--r-- 1 8800 0 187437 Feb 12 14:34 tzcode2007b.tar .gz
-rw-r--r-- 1 8800 0 157432 Feb 12 14:34 tzdata2007b.tar .gz

Put those into their own directories, un-tar, and follow the instructions
in the tzcode file. The tool you'll need is 'zic' which is part of that
package.

NOTE FOR OTHERS: The difference between the tzdata2007a and tzdata2007b
packages is only a notice in the "leapsecond s" file, announcing that there
will not be a leapsecond at the end of June. If you have tzdata2007a,
there is no need to update.

>Ideal option: RPM patch.

2. Possible option:

Get the latest tzdata rpm from a Mandrake/Mandriva updates server. If you
are not in The Bahamas, version 2006p is adequate. If you are not in Canada
or Bermuda, version 2006n is acceptable. As root, try the following command

rpm -F --test /path/to/tzdata2006mumbl e.rpm

(making suitable substitution for package filename and location). If rpm
does not barf, you can run the command again without the --test option to
actually do the upgrade. Then, restart all applications (a reboot might
be required in some cases).

>Worst option: upgrade OS (it's a very old machine).

No, that's the best option. If the hardware doesn't have the horsepower to
be running the latest bells/whistles of Mandriva, consider another
distribution. Remember also that X really has no place on a server, because
_USERS_ have no place on a server, and X is drawing pictures that no one
can see. Wasted CPU cycles.

Old guy