[Talk-us] Timezones in USA?
Greg Troxel
gdt at ir.bbn.com
Fri May 27 12:56:08 UTC 2016
Bill Ricker <bill.n1vux at gmail.com> writes:
>> I would think the decision on whether time zone boundaries should be
>> in OSM should center on what the costs and benefits of having them
>> in OSM are. The costs seem likely related to how they will be
>> maintained and whether they will be kept up-to-date, and the
>> benefits are tied to those who would find the data useful.
>
> Agreed.
>
> A compatible layer from elsewhere would be good enough
>
> for most purposes, and possibly better for many.
>
Except that the compatible layer doesn't easily exist, and it isn't
necessarily tied to the OSM elements that map the boundaries referenced
in the rules, and there aren't tools for this.
>> (I should also note that the boundaries of tz database regions
>> change substantially less often than the actual time rules for the
>> regions.)
>
> Quite so.
I am unaware of any significant changes in US timezone boundaries (I
mean the zones themselves, not who does DST and when). I don't think we
have evidence that the flux is so large that our data would be
significantly off.
> But they can change both without a political boundary move and will also
> move if the boundary they follow moves.
> And can be moved unilaterally, it doesn't take consent of the parties
> formerly and prospectively on the other side of the moved boundary.
That's all true, but how bad is the reality?
> So it's more fluid than we expect in similar meta-relations like
> municipality (which likely has on-the-ground markings, not only road signs
> but also surveyors benchmarks at corners) or boundary
> <http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:boundary>=postal_code
> <http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:boundary%3Dpostal_code> (which
> typicall has no on-the-ground marking of boundary, only point markings at
> the Post Office and Mail collection boxes will be labeled on the ground).
Yes, but "more fluid" doesn't arrive at "therefore the rate is so high
this doesn't make sense".
If people want to maintain a few relations, and perhaps an occasional
extra way (if the tz boundary doesn't follow an existing boundary), why
is it necessary to give them a hard time about it? People talk about
the importance of community, and telling people they can't map things
that they want to map because it doesn't meet someone else's absolute
standard discourages participation.
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