Configuring Time Zones

To support businesses spanning across multiple time zones, the system stores all date and time information in a single common time zone known as the base time zone or the server time zone. Furthermore, date and time information is stored in either standard time (i.e. independent of any Daylight Savings Time adjustments, if applicable, in that time zone) or legal time (i.e. shifted according to Daylight Savings Time).

The system also allows data to be entered and displayed in a different time zone in legal time ( i.e. adjusted for Daylight Savings Time, managing the conversion back and forth between the data entry time zone and the storage time zone).

Entities associated with a physical location such as measurements (initial and final), measuring components, device configurations, devices, installation events, service points, and usage subscriptions are entered and displayed in the specific time zone where they occur, the entity time zone. The rest of the application uses the base time zone to display date and time information.

When configuring time zones the following fields are of high importance:

Time Zone Name: identifies the Olson time zone and as such defines the appropriate offset from Greenwhich Mean Time as well as the schedule for shifting into and out of Daylight Savings Time.

Default Time Zone Label: will be appended to date times that do not fall within Daylight Savings Time

Shifted Time Zone Label: will be appended to date times that do fall within Daylight Savings Time

Note: The server time zone must be correctly specified on the installation options record for the system to work properly.

For additional information see Defining Time Zones in the Oracle Utilities Application Framework Administrative User Guide.