R devel - Nov 2007 - daylight saving / time zone issues with as.POSIXlt/as.POSIXct (PR#10393)

tplate at acm.org wrote:
> Running under Windows XP 64 bit, as.POSIXlt()/as.POSIXct() seem
> to think that US time zones (EST5EDT, MST7MDT) switched from daylight
> savings back to standard time on Oct 28, 2007, whereas the switch
> is actually on Sun Nov 04, 2007.
>
>  =20
Not Our Problem. (This sort of thing never is. We are wholly dependent=20
on the OS for this information). Check out

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/933360
> Examples:
>
>  > Sys.timezone()
> [1] "Mountain Daylight Time"
>  > as.POSIXct("2007-10-30 12:38:47")
> [1] "2007-10-30 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>  > # *** Should report 2007-10-30 14:38:47 EDT:
>  > as.POSIXlt(as.POSIXct("2007-10-30 12:38:47"),
"EST5EDT")
> [1] "2007-10-30 13:38:47 EST"
>  > Sys.time()
> [1] "2007-11-01 09:22:28 Mountain Daylight Time"
>
>  > # Bad behavior is manifested in different ways with
TZ=3D"MST7MDT"
>  > Sys.setenv(TZ=3D"MST7MDT")
>  > # *** Should report "12:38:47 MDT"
>  > as.POSIXct("2007-10-30 12:38:47")
> [1] "2007-10-30 12:38:47 MST"
>  > as.POSIXlt(as.POSIXct("2007-10-30 12:38:47"),
"EST5EDT")
> [1] "2007-10-30 14:38:47 EST"
>  > # *** Should report "2007-11-01 09:23:09 MDT"
>  > Sys.time()
> [1] "2007-11-01 08:23:09 MST"
>  >
>  > sessionInfo()
> R version 2.6.0 Patched (2007-10-11 r43143)
> i386-pc-mingw32
>
> locale:
> LC_COLLATE=3DEnglish_United States.1252;LC_CTYPE=3DEnglish_United
States.1252;LC_MONETARY=3DEnglish_United
States.1252;LC_NUMERIC=3DC;LC_TIME=3DEnglish_United States.1252
>
> attached base packages:
> [1] stats     graphics  grDevices utils     datasets  methods   base
>  >
>
>
> Furthermore, with the timezone "Mountain Daylight Time"
> (which is the default I get when I start R), the switch
> appears to be on Nov 5 in 2006, whereas it actually was
> on Oct 29 in 2006.
>
>  > # New R session
>  > Sys.timezone()
> [1] "Mountain Daylight Time"
>  > # *** wrong switch in 2006 ***
>  > as.POSIXct("2006-10-30 12:38:47")+(-4:7)*(24*3600)
>   [1] "2006-10-26 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [2] "2006-10-27 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [3] "2006-10-28 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [4] "2006-10-29 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [5] "2006-10-30 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [6] "2006-10-31 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [7] "2006-11-01 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [8] "2006-11-02 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [9] "2006-11-03 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
> [10] "2006-11-04 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
> [11] "2006-11-05 11:38:47 Mountain Standard Time"
> [12] "2006-11-06 11:38:47 Mountain Standard Time"
>  > as.POSIXct("2007-10-30 12:38:47")+(-4:7)*(24*3600)
>   [1] "2007-10-26 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [2] "2007-10-27 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [3] "2007-10-28 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [4] "2007-10-29 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [5] "2007-10-30 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [6] "2007-10-31 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [7] "2007-11-01 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [8] "2007-11-02 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
>   [9] "2007-11-03 12:38:47 Mountain Daylight Time"
> [10] "2007-11-04 11:38:47 Mountain Standard Time"
> [11] "2007-11-05 11:38:47 Mountain Standard Time"
> [12] "2007-11-06 11:38:47 Mountain Standard Time"
>  > Sys.setenv(TZ=3D"MST7MDT")
>  > Sys.timezone()
> [1] "MST"
>  > as.POSIXct("2006-10-30 12:38:47")+(-4:7)*(24*3600)
>   [1] "2006-10-26 13:38:47 MDT" "2006-10-27 13:38:47
MDT"
>   [3] "2006-10-28 13:38:47 MDT" "2006-10-29 12:38:47
MST"
>   [5] "2006-10-30 12:38:47 MST" "2006-10-31 12:38:47
MST"
>   [7] "2006-11-01 12:38:47 MST" "2006-11-02 12:38:47
MST"
>   [9] "2006-11-03 12:38:47 MST" "2006-11-04 12:38:47
MST"
> [11] "2006-11-05 12:38:47 MST" "2006-11-06 12:38:47
MST"
>  > # *** wrong switch in 2007 ***
>  > as.POSIXct("2007-10-30 12:38:47")+(-4:7)*(24*3600)
>   [1] "2007-10-26 13:38:47 MDT" "2007-10-27 13:38:47
MDT"
>   [3] "2007-10-28 12:38:47 MST" "2007-10-29 12:38:47
MST"
>   [5] "2007-10-30 12:38:47 MST" "2007-10-31 12:38:47
MST"
>   [7] "2007-11-01 12:38:47 MST" "2007-11-02 12:38:47
MST"
>   [9] "2007-11-03 12:38:47 MST" "2007-11-04 12:38:47
MST"
> [11] "2007-11-05 12:38:47 MST" "2007-11-06 12:38:47
MST"
>  >
>
> I see this behavior on all the Windows systems I have tried:
> Windows XP 64 bit, Windows XP 32 bit Pro, Windows XP home,
> Windows 2000, with a variety of R versions.  The systems
> have all relevant Windows updates applied (unless some were
> inadvertently missed) and the systems otherwise appear to
> behave correctly with respect to times and timezones.
>
> I do not see this problem on Ubuntu Linux systems.
>
> -- Tony Plate
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>  =20

--=20
   O__  ---- Peter Dalgaard             =D8ster Farimagsgade 5, Entr.B
  c/ /'_ --- Dept. of Biostatistics     PO Box 2099, 1014 Cph. K
 (*) \(*) -- University of Copenhagen   Denmark          Ph:  (+45) 35327918
~~~~~~~~~~ - (p.dalgaard at biostat.ku.dk)                  FAX: (+45) 35327907