Daylight saving time (1 Viewer)

[Mike Amory]

Today Daylight Saving Time moved the clocks of all my computers one hour towards the summer and MediaPortal stopped all the active recordings. It looks like MediaPortal can't handle Daylight Saving Time correctly. I think that all active recording should ignore the Daylight Saving Time changes and keep recording and all new recordings should use the new Daylight Saving Time. Am I right or am I right?

 

[CyberSimian]

I think that all active recording should ignore the Daylight Saving Time changes and keep recording and all new recordings should use the new Daylight Saving Time.

Switching to and from Daylight Saving Time is notoriously difficult for media centers and DVRs to get right. WMC got it right only half the time, and my Humax DVRs (two different models) never got it right. We can hope that MP will address this issue sometime in the future.

In the mean time, I make a point of never scheduling a recording that spans the clock change, or which starts less than two hours after the clock change. In addition, I schedule a short dummy recording that starts two hours after the clock change. The purpose of this dummy recording is to wake the HTPC so that it can alter its internal clock, and then decide that the start time has already passed (this happened last night), and so return to sleep without recording anything. But the subsequent recordings will then be correct.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

 

[mm1352000]

We can hope that MP will address this issue sometime in the future.

Aye, it's a huge task.
AFAIK the best way to handle it properly is to store all timing data as UTC/GMT dates/times, then convert to local time-zone for display.
(Currently we store all timing data as local dates/times.)

 

[Mike Amory]

Is it possible to have 2 separate clocks? Computer's clock, that always shows the right time, and program's internal clock. The computer's clock triggers the start time of new recordings, but the end time is based on the count of minutes since starting the recording. The program's internal clock would just count seconds since starting the program. This means that if you change date and time of the computer, it doesn't have any effect on the active recordings. Just an idea.

 

[mm1352000]

No matter how you slice/dice the problem, the challenges in solving it with a robust solution are not insignificant.

We acknowledge there are issues with the handling of daylight savings transitions. They're on our radar, and we'll deal with them as best we can and as soon as practically possible.

 

[Mike Amory]

No matter how you slice/dice the problem, the challenges in solving it with a robust solution are not insignificant.

We acknowledge there are issues with the handling of daylight savings transitions. They're on our radar, and we'll deal with them as best we can and as soon as practically possible.

OK. This is not a big issue. It happens only twice a year and it's quite easy to manually change the pre-record and post-record times. Recent studies show that changing time back and forth is bad for people's health. It looks like Daylight Saving Time will be dumped soon. So maybe it's better to wait and see. Anyway, thank you for your efforts.

 

[mm1352000]

Just to note...
On Windows XP (assume an equivalent is available for newer versions of Windows) there's a [Windows] "automatically adjust clock for daylight saving changes" option in the time zone tab of the date and time properties dialog (double-click on the time in the bottom right corner):


Disabling that option may save you having to mess with pre/post recording, enabling you to adjust the time when it's safe (ie. no recordings running).
Better? I don't know. Another option to consider.

 

[Mike Amory]

Just to note...
On Windows XP (assume an equivalent is available for newer versions of Windows) there's a [Windows] "automatically adjust clock for daylight saving changes" option in the time zone tab of the date and time properties dialog (double-click on the time in the bottom right corner):
View attachment 188591

Disabling that option may save you having to mess with pre/post recording, enabling you to adjust the time when it's safe (ie. no recordings running).
Better? I don't know. Another option to consider.

You are right! I have Win7 and it has this option. Thank you for the tip.