As you may have read, Fiji has decided to shift their move back to standard time earlier than originally planned in 2012. This from the Government of Fiji…
“The end of daylight saving scheduled initially for the 26th of February 2012 has been brought forward to the 22nd of January 2012.
“The commencement of daylight saving will remain unchanged and start on the 23rd of October, 2011. An official gazette reflecting this change will be released early this week.”
Technical Changes
The change will be a move from the original scheduled date of Sunday, February 26, to January 22, 2012. Folks in Fiji will then turn back their clocks one hour from 3:00:00 AM FJST (Fiji Summer Time) to 2:00:00 AM FJT (that’s Fiji Time).
Now, who wouldn’t want to be on Fiji Time? I thought it was always summer time in Fiji, where the temperatures in summer and winter are around 85-88ºF (or 30ºC for my shivering friends up north).
Associated challenges
There are also other social challenges as this change happens with only a few months warning. Here’s our regular advice for governments: in support of these types of changes, we provide guidance and 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.
What’s Microsoft doing about this change?
Microsoft is aware of the upcoming change in time zone, ending daylight saving time earlier in Fiji, and we will work to minimize the impact this change has on our customers and partners. As with other changes to daylight saving time and time zones (like the impending change in Russia noted here), this will require an update to the OS, likely as part of the Windows December Cumulative Update. Most applications and services reference the underlying Windows OS for their TZ and DST rules, with some exceptions. This change in Fiji has the potential for worldwide impacts on time references for multinational customers. Updates will be important not only for users in Fiji but for connected systems around the world. Further information will be shared here and reported on our official Daylight Saving Time Help and Support Centre at http://www.microsoft.com/time as status updates are available.
Tags: Microsoft, Daylight Saving Time, Daylight Savings Time, RSS, DST, Fiji
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