Local time on the display

[airguy]

It would be very convenient if the local time on the Skyview display could be adjusted to true local time automatically - currently crossing a time zone does not change the display time to local time, it has to be changed manually. With the GPS timestamp and location known, it seems that this would be an easy change to have the software incorporate.

 

[dynonsupport]

We've considered this, but it's far from trivial to implement. Just for the USA, the time zones are full of nooks, crannies, and holes, as well as political issues where states or counties don't obey DST, and the DST dates change year to year. There are straight paths over the USA where you can go back and forth between time zones a few times in just a few minutes at 200 MPH.

If someone knows of a good database that can take a lat/long and date and accurately tell you the time at that position, we could consider it. There are ones that relate to cities, but that won't give you an accurate switch-over in rural areas.

http://www.worldtimezone.com/time-usa12.php

 

[Raymo]

I work with software and this would be extremely difficult, if not impossible to implement and likely expensive to maintain. When the DST date changed back in 2007, we had to spend months and piles of money to deal with the change and piles more to deal historical (archived) data.

Zulu time exists for this very reason. I keep one SV screen on local time and the other on Zulu.

On the other hand, phone companies deal with it fairly well.

 

[Ccandrews]

I agree that local and Zulu would be convenient. For local, manual selection of the appropriate time zone would be a good first step

 

[Raymo]

I agree that local and Zulu would be convenient. For local, manual selection of the appropriate time zone would be a good first step

This would still require that the SV know all the nooks and crannies of where DST is in use or not (e.g. AZ). It is easy enough to adjust to local time when DST changes, IMO.

I keep one screen on local and the other on UTC.

 

[dynonsupport]

Getting rid of Daylight Savings time would also be a good first step.

 

[mmarien]

Saskatchewan is permanent DST. We should be in MST but pretend we're in CST. As a result we get dizzy watching other places set their clocks back and forth. I'm just guessing but cellular time is probably done at the tower. It's a fixed position and time zone. A moving object like an airplane would have to have a complicated map to sort it out. It's not all that easy. Android devices still have trouble with time zones. One of my weather applications gets out a day on the forecasts when I travel. Google calendar is totally unreliable in a different time zone.

What I do know is that when I get advise from FSS they give the time in ZULU and a quick glance at the time displayed on my SV puts it in perspective. The local time on my cell phone, not so much.

Most of the world doesn't use DST or is permanent DST. It's just us nitwits in the western world that waffle on the subject. Much like this post. :