Advisory: Bangladesh makes a last-minute decision to end daylight saving time on December 31, 2009

Yes, it’s true, Virgina: once again a government has decided on making a last minute change to their daylight saving time. Quite reminiscent of when Argentina made a change to their their daylight saving time back in 2007 and brought me into the office virtually whilst I was on vacation.

<rant> Less than a week is a tough time to get everyone in the region – regardless of operating system, time piece or sundial – alerted to a change of this magnitude. In order to achieve more seamless transitions to new DST rules and time zones, ample advance notice and concentrated efforts on promoting any change should be provided to the people and businesses impacted. </rant>

This time, Bangladesh decided to end daylight saving time on December 31, 2009 as noted on the Microsoft Daylight Saving Time & Time Zone Blog…

On Monday, December 28, 2009 the Bangladesh government announced that, following a cabinet decision last week, the clocks would move back one hour to standard time at 11:59 PM on Dec 31. The decision was also reported on The Daily Star.
A notice from the power ministry on Sunday, however, clarified that clocks would be set back again one minute before midnight on Dec 31.

The notice also stated that the government has decided to continue with Daylight Saving Time from 2010 to ensure maximum utility of daylight.
Clocks will be advanced to 11:59pm (GMT+7) from 10:59 pm on March 31, to continue until Oct 31.
They will be turned back to 10:59pm (GMT+6) from 11:59 pm on Oct 31, to run until March 31.

This communication only addresses recommendations for the Dec 31, 2009 change. Microsoft will communicate future guidance for the 2010 DST transitions.

Users on all Windows OS platforms can switch their computers to the Central Asia Standard Time (Display name: (GMT+06:00) Astana. For users that did not apply KB978125, the time zone display name will look like this: (GMT+06:00) Astana, Dhaka).

Alternatively, for Windows OS versions released earlier than Vista, users may opt to update the registry key manually if they previously applied KB978125. Please note that the registry key value will be different if this operation is performed before Jan 1, 2010 than if it is performed after the start of the New Year, 2010. The reason for this is that the registry key value is different in 2009 than it is in 2010. Details on how to perform this operation can be found below in the section titled: “Manual Method to Perform DST Changes on down level platforms from Vista”.

An important note for Consumers:

For those customers (consumers, small businesses) wondering "Does this mean I have to install the updates manually?"

No. Generally, consumers should wait for the updates to be installed via Windows Update rather than download and install these from the DLC. And for end users who have their PCs managed by a central administrator, your IT folks will handle the distribution and updating of your PCs over the network. (When in doubt, ask. 😉

A note for IT Professionals:

More information including registry updates for folks who know how to do such things is available over at the Microsoft Daylight Saving Time & Time Zone Blog.

And now, a little history.

Microsoft’s product teams have moved to a regular rhythm to update their products and services to reflect time changes. For each update release, Microsoft accepts change requests at up to a few months prior to the release date. Please refer to Microsoft’s Policy in Response to DST/TZ Requests, providing recommendations in order to achieve more seamless transitions to new DST and time zones policies. We suggest that governments should provide the following when considering changing DST or making adjustments to time zones:

Ample advance notice (1 year or more) of the planned change.
Official published confirmation of planned changes to DST or time zones.
Concentrated efforts on promoting the change to the affected citizens.

Important notes for governments:

Please refer to Microsoft’s Policy in Response to DST/TZ Requests. It’s important for countries and territories to work towards seamless transitions to new DST and time zones policies, providing ample advance notice (of a year or more) with published confirmation of planned changes.
We suggest that entities planning DST changes consider implementing changes at the next clock tick after 01:59:59 rather than at 00:00:00. Making the change at midnight can impact daily systems, such as back-ups, financial reports, data pulls or other automated tasks.

Tags: Windows, Microsoft, Daylight Saving Time, Daylight Savings Time, RSS, DST; 18,000,000; 20,400,000 (up >3M)

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