Daylight Savings Change

Many countries are transitioning from their Daylight Savings period for 2008. This often causes confusion with end-users on your forums because their time zone as reflected by vBulletin will change when they view the forums. The key to this is to show them that the time is correct and that at actual difference from GMT doesn't change.

The confusion is cause by how Daylight Savings is applied. When Daylight Savings goes into affect in the Spring, the clocks are moved ahead one hour. This effectively changes your timezone by one hour as well. GMT will always remain the zero meridian and doesn't change because of political time manipulations like this. In the fall, you move the clock back one hour or effectively gain an hour for timezone purposes. This reversal puts the clocks back on Standard Time.

Standard Timezones are calculated for periods where Daylight Savings Time is not in affect or the winter months. Also please note that Southern Hemisphere countries are the opposite of their Northern Hemisphere counterparts. While most of the world's population is leaving Daylight Savings Time this time of the year, those in the Southern Hemisphere are just entering it.

Some examples:
Los Angelos - Standard Time is GMT -8. Daylight Savings is GMT -7.
New York - Standard Time is GMT -5. Daylight Savings is GMT-4.
London - Standard Time is GMT. Daylight Savings is GMT +1.
Sydney - Standard Time is GMT +10, Daylight Savings is GMT +11.
Dubai - Standard Time is GMT +4, Daylight Savings is not Observed.

To see which countries observe Daylight Savings Time and when the times switch for this season please look at:
http://www.timeanddate.com/time/dst2008.html