linux time zones

<a href="linux_time_zones">
  <img class="right" src="clock.jpg" /></a>

I recently had to change the
time zone on a linux server, and while linux _handles_ time zones and locales
well, _changing_ the system's time zone isn't well documented.

I searched for a single command that would do it, probably run as root, but no
luck. `zdump(8)`, `zic(8)`, and `tzfile(5)` have lots of good information, but none of
them actually changes the time zone.

After some googling, I determined that `/etc/localtime` determines the system's
time zone. It's usually a copy of or symlink to a file in `/usr/share/zoneinfo`. I
ended up symlinking it to `PST8PDT`, for Pacific Time. If you're in another time
zone, the file names should be self-explanatory. (There's [more
information](http://lists.debian.org/debian-user/1996/04/msg00527.html) on the
debian-user mailing list.)

Many distributions come with tools for setting the time zone. Debian and
Fedora have
[tzselect(8)](http://www.linuxcommand.org/man_pages/tzselect8.html), which is
marginally helpful. Debian also has
[tzconfig(8)](http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/system-administrator/ch-sysadmin-time.html),
which is much more useful.