Re: Very unique need

[William Heath]

I am finding more info about the geometry possibilities of timezones mapped
onto a spherical globe.  You can see this at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:2007-02-20_time_zones_white_bck.svg

I need to know how this image was generated though.  Any ideas how I could
find out?

-Tim

P.S.

I need all cities not just major cities.

On Mon, Mar 24, 2008 at 2:03 PM, Jerrad Pierce <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> You've still not really clarified your intent, but you appear to mean only
> large cities, in which case you can scrape much of this information from
> wikipedia as Time zone is a standard field in the RHS info box for cities.
> I'm sure you could piece together a simplified version of the rest as
> well.
> --
> Free map of local environmental resources: http://CambridgeMA.GreenMap.org
> --
> MOTD on Pungenday, the 10th of Discord, in the YOLD 3174:
> How did it get so late so soon? It's night before it's afternoon. December
> is here before it's June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get
> so late so soon? -Dr. Seuss
>

Re: Very unique need

[Jerrad Pierce]

You've still not really clarified your intent, but you appear to mean only
large cities, in which case you can scrape much of this information from
wikipedia as Time zone is a standard field in the RHS info box for cities.
I'm sure you could piece together a simplified version of the rest as well.
-- 
Free map of local environmental resources: http://CambridgeMA.GreenMap.org
--
MOTD on Pungenday, the 10th of Discord, in the YOLD 3174:
How did it get so late so soon? It's night before it's afternoon. December is 
here before it's June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so 
late so soon? -Dr. Seuss

RE: Very unique need

[Harder, Paul]

Oh, do you have a source of lat/lon coordinates for the boundaries of
time zones?  It's a nontrivial task to compile one and keep it up to
date, and I'm not aware of anybody who has taken on the responsibility
of doing that. I hope you can show me that I'm an uniformed boob!


___
Paul H. Harder II, Ph.D., AMS
Meteorologist and Software Developer
Weather Insight, L.P.
www.WeatherInsight.com
Direct: 713-361-4966, Tech Support: 713-361-4985
Weather Insight - Redefining Weather Risk Management

This e-mail is strictly confidential, privileged, and only for the use
of the intended recipients.  Please notify sender immediately if you
have received this in error.  Unauthorized interception of this e-mail
is a violation of federal criminal law.


-Original Message-
From: William Heath [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Monday, March 24, 2008 20:49
To: Harder, Paul
Cc: datetime@perl.org
Subject: Re: Very unique need

I think I may have found a possible solution.  If you go to:

http://www.world-gazetteer.com/wg.php?x=&men=gcis&lng=en&des=wg&srt=npan
&col=abcdefghinoq&msz=1500&geo=-54

You can find all the cities for a certain country with their
longitude/latitude.  I believe it is possible to know the
longitudes/latitudes for a certain timezone yes?  If so then you can
know all the countries and cities in a certain timezone.  There is also
a perl module for interfacing with the gazetteer data at:

http://search.cpan.org/~lbrocard/WWW-Gazetteer-0.23/Gazetteer.pm

The only problem I have now then is finding the postal codes for the
cities.  Any ideas on that?

-Tim

On Mon, Mar 24, 2008 at 1:27 PM, Harder, Paul <
[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>  That is not, in fact, a unique need.  I have it too, but I find that
> I am having to live my life without satisfying the need. Hmmm...,
> maybe it's just a "want".  The sad fact is that there is no source of
> information (that I or anybody else on this list has been able to
> find) that gives you what you want.  To know all of the cities, towns,
> villages, hamlets and airports that are within a given time zone, you
> will have to actually visit all of the cities, towns, villages,
> hamlets and airports in the world, ask them what time zone they are
> in, and compile a database from which you can later select only those
> cities, towns, villages, hamlets and airports in the zone of interest.

> Of course, by the time you finish a small subset of that task, some of
> those cities, towns villages, hamlets and airports will have changed
> from one time zone to another, and they likely won't think to tell you
> about it. To further complicate this, many countries and states are
> divided among multiple time zones, and there is nothing (in principle)
> to prevent even a postal code to be so divided if the folks who live
there choose to divide it.
> If that sounds like I'm depressed... Call me "Eeyore".  I'm finding
> ways to work around the issue. I hope you do to.
>
> Then again, if you ever do find a solution to this problem, I hope
> you'll remember to tell all of us here on this list.
>
>
> ___
> Paul H. Harder II, Ph.D., AMS
> Meteorologist and Software Developer
> Weather Insight, L.P.
> www.WeatherInsight.com
> Direct: 713-361-4966, Tech Support: 713-361-4985 Weather Insight -
> Redefining Weather Risk Management
>
> This e-mail is strictly confidential, privileged, and only for the use
> of the intended recipients.  Please notify sender immediately if you
> have received this in error.  Unauthorized interception of this e-mail
> is a violation of federal criminal law.
>
>
>
> -Original Message-
> From: William Heath [
> mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>]
>
> Sent: Monday, March 24, 2008 20:17
> To: datetime@perl.org
> Subject: Very unique need
>
> Hi All,
>
> I am enjoying DateTime::TimeZone as usual.  I have a unique need to be
> able to somehow know all the countries, cities, and postal codes that
> are in a certain TimeZone, can anyone recommend a way to do that?
>
> -Tim
>

Re: Very unique need

[William Heath]

I think I may have found a possible solution.  If you go to:

http://www.world-gazetteer.com/wg.php?x=&men=gcis&lng=en&des=wg&srt=npan&col=abcdefghinoq&msz=1500&geo=-54

You can find all the cities for a certain country with their
longitude/latitude.  I believe it is possible to know the
longitudes/latitudes for a certain timezone yes?  If so then you can know
all the countries and cities in a certain timezone.  There is also a perl
module for interfacing with the gazetteer data at:

http://search.cpan.org/~lbrocard/WWW-Gazetteer-0.23/Gazetteer.pm

The only problem I have now then is finding the postal codes for the
cities.  Any ideas on that?

-Tim

On Mon, Mar 24, 2008 at 1:27 PM, Harder, Paul <
[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>  That is not, in fact, a unique need.  I have it too, but I find that I am
> having to live my life without satisfying the need. Hmmm..., maybe it's just
> a "want".  The sad fact is that there is no source of information (that I or
> anybody else on this list has been able to find) that gives you what you
> want.  To know all of the cities, towns, villages, hamlets and airports that
> are within a given time zone, you will have to actually visit all of the
> cities, towns, villages, hamlets and airports in the world, ask them what
> time zone they are in, and compile a database from which you can later
> select only those cities, towns, villages, hamlets and airports in the zone
> of interest.  Of course, by the time you finish a small subset of that task,
> some of those cities, towns villages, hamlets and airports will have changed
> from one time zone to another, and they likely won't think to tell you about
> it. To further complicate this, many countries and states are divided among
> multiple time zones, and there is nothing (in principle) to prevent even a
> postal code to be so divided if the folks who live there choose to divide
> it.
> If that sounds like I'm depressed... Call me "Eeyore".  I'm finding ways
> to work around the issue. I hope you do to.
>
> Then again, if you ever do find a solution to this problem, I hope you'll
> remember to tell all of us here on this list.
>
>
> ___
> Paul H. Harder II, Ph.D., AMS
> Meteorologist and Software Developer
> Weather Insight, L.P.
> www.WeatherInsight.com
> Direct: 713-361-4966, Tech Support: 713-361-4985
> Weather Insight - Redefining Weather Risk Management
>
> This e-mail is strictly confidential, privileged, and only for the use of
> the intended recipients.  Please notify sender immediately if you have
> received this in error.  Unauthorized interception of this e-mail is a
> violation of federal criminal law.
>
>
>
> -Original Message-
> From: William Heath [
> mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>]
>
> Sent: Monday, March 24, 2008 20:17
> To: datetime@perl.org
> Subject: Very unique need
>
> Hi All,
>
> I am enjoying DateTime::TimeZone as usual.  I have a unique need to be
> able to somehow know all the countries, cities, and postal codes that are in
> a certain TimeZone, can anyone recommend a way to do that?
>
> -Tim
>

Re: Very unique need

[Eugene van der Pijll]

Harder, Paul schreef:
> That is not, in fact, a unique need.  I have it too, but I find that I
> am having to live my life without satisfying the need. Hmmm..., maybe
> it's just a "want".  The sad fact is that there is no source of
> information (that I or anybody else on this list has been able to find)
> that gives you what you want.

(resent to whole list)

Have you looked at the database of geonames.org? It looks like it
contains the information you're looking for, but I have not checked if   
all settlements in the database really have their timezones filled in.

You can download dumps for each countries, containing location and
timezone for all populated places, or you can use their web API.

Eugene

RE: Very unique need

[Harder, Paul]

That is not, in fact, a unique need.  I have it too, but I find that I
am having to live my life without satisfying the need. Hmmm..., maybe
it's just a "want".  The sad fact is that there is no source of
information (that I or anybody else on this list has been able to find)
that gives you what you want.  To know all of the cities, towns,
villages, hamlets and airports that are within a given time zone, you
will have to actually visit all of the cities, towns, villages, hamlets
and airports in the world, ask them what time zone they are in, and
compile a database from which you can later select only those cities,
towns, villages, hamlets and airports in the zone of interest.  Of
course, by the time you finish a small subset of that task, some of
those cities, towns villages, hamlets and airports will have changed
from one time zone to another, and they likely won't think to tell you
about it. To further complicate this, many countries and states are
divided among multiple time zones, and there is nothing (in principle)
to prevent even a postal code to be so divided if the folks who live
there choose to divide it.

If that sounds like I'm depressed... Call me "Eeyore".  I'm finding ways
to work around the issue. I hope you do to.
 
Then again, if you ever do find a solution to this problem, I hope
you'll remember to tell all of us here on this list.


___
Paul H. Harder II, Ph.D., AMS
Meteorologist and Software Developer
Weather Insight, L.P.
www.WeatherInsight.com
Direct: 713-361-4966, Tech Support: 713-361-4985
Weather Insight - Redefining Weather Risk Management

This e-mail is strictly confidential, privileged, and only for the use
of the intended recipients.  Please notify sender immediately if you
have received this in error.  Unauthorized interception of this e-mail
is a violation of federal criminal law.


-Original Message-
From: William Heath [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
]
Sent: Monday, March 24, 2008 20:17
To: datetime@perl.org
Subject: Very unique need

Hi All,

I am enjoying DateTime::TimeZone as usual.  I have a unique need to be
able to somehow know all the countries, cities, and postal codes that
are in a certain TimeZone, can anyone recommend a way to do that?

-Tim

Re: Very unique need

[Jerrad Pierce]

>I am enjoying DateTime::TimeZone as usual.  I have a unique need to be able
>to somehow know all the countries, cities, and postal codes that are in a
>certain TimeZone, can anyone recommend a way to do that?
What you ask is nigh impossible, at least in the most general case as phrased*
Besides being a union of disparate data types, many of which are updated
relatively frequently, it amounts to a huge (and expensive, if even accesible)
dataset as well.

You might be better off giving some explanation of what it is you are trying
to do, and why you think this is really necessary.

*Without a metric shitload of resources at your disposable, or equally many
 grossly simplified assumptions.
-- 
Free map of local environmental resources: http://CambridgeMA.GreenMap.org
--
MOTD on Pungenday, the 10th of Discord, in the YOLD 3174:
How did it get so late so soon? It's night before it's afternoon. December is 
here before it's June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so 
late so soon? -Dr. Seuss

Re: Very unique need

[Dave Rolsky]

On Mon, 24 Mar 2008, William Heath wrote:


I am enjoying DateTime::TimeZone as usual.  I have a unique need to be able
to somehow know all the countries, cities, and postal codes that are in a
certain TimeZone, can anyone recommend a way to do that?


_If_ you could get the geographic data describing a zone (as in "what 
shape is it") suitable for inserting into a GIS-capable DBMS like 
Postgres, then you could relatively easily do queries asking what cities 
or postal codes are in a given time zone.


I would note that postal codes and countries are themselves shapes which 
could be in more than one time zone. I don't think there are any 
multi-zone cities, fortunately.


However, getting this data and keeping it up to date seems like a very 
difficult proposition.



-dave

/*==
VegGuide.Org
Your guide to all that's veg
==*/

Very unique need

[William Heath]

Hi All,

I am enjoying DateTime::TimeZone as usual.  I have a unique need to be able
to somehow know all the countries, cities, and postal codes that are in a
certain TimeZone, can anyone recommend a way to do that?

-Tim

Re: ANNOUNCE: DateTime::TimeZone 0.74

[Rick Measham]

Dave Rolsky wrote:

  Iraq


Oh, finally some good news from Iraq! They've abandoned DST!

Cheers!
Rick Measham
--
Message  protected for iSite by MailGuard: e-mail anti-virus, anti-spam and 
content filtering.
http://www.mailguard.com.au

ANNOUNCE: DateTime::TimeZone 0.74

[Dave Rolsky]

0.74 2008-03-24

- This release is based on version 2008b of the Olson database. The
  major changes in this release are for San Luis in Argentina, Cuba,
  Iraq, and Syria.



-dave

/*==
VegGuide.Org
Your guide to all that's veg
==*/