[Bob G]

I am on a business trip and therefore am having to deal with the nasty combination of calendar shortcomings in Outlook 2003 and BlackBerry. I've read many of the posts here and experimented plenty. Now I think I have resigned myself to the following work-around:

When I reach my destination, I manually (how prehistoric!) change the time zones on my BlackBerry and my PC. Before I synchronize (I have BIS.), I change both the BB and the PC back to my home time zone. After synchronizing, I change them both back to the local time zone again.

This is because Outlook changes all appointments when you change the time zone, even the "all day events." BlackBerry handles the "all day events" correctly and leaves them alone. So if you synchronize outside of your home time zone, the desktop manager will mess up your calendar.

The Palm OS has a check box in appointments for "no time zone," which BlackBerry and Outlook desperately need. So if I set a reminder to fill out my time sheet at 5 pm, it remains on the calendar at 5 pm, regardless of whether I am in Hong Kong or Houston. Other appointments (like a telecon with suppliers in different time zones) change the local time as I travel to keep the same actual time (GMT).

Unfortunately, as of BB OS 4.5, BlackBerry does not have a "no time zone" option, nor an option to automatically update local time. And as far as I know (Can anyone confirm this?), Outlook 2007 doesn't have a "no time zone" option, doesn't automatically update local time, and still messes up "all day events" when you change time zones.

It makes me wonder if anyone at RIM or Microsoft have ever traveled (or listened to their customers who have)! After all these years of making computerized calendars, these companies should have figured out the basics. Grrrrrrrrr!

[sunkast]

Have you read this thread? http://forums.crackberry.com/f2/blac...e-zones-46190/

[Bob G]

Yes, that is a great thread; it helped me to understand how time is handled on the BlackBerry.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[jeffh]

I'm glad you found my Time Zones Implementation thread useful. Thanks to sunkast for the link. I've just updated it with a link to new posts by royhiggs. Roy explains the "why" behind the implementation, and points to the solution.

The way Outlook corrupts all-day appointments is especially frustrating to me. At least Outlook 2007 has time zone drop down selectors, so that will help that problem.

[Bob G]

Another thing I should mention as a good reason to change both the BB and PC to your home time zone before synchronization:

The BlackBerry (at least in mass storage mode on OS 4.5.0.81) doesn't handle the file modification times correctly on the SD card. When I change the time zone on the PC, the file modification times adjust accordingly. On the BlackBerry, the file modification times remain as if the time zone was still set to my home time zone.

Since I use a file synchronization utility to keep my data on the BlackBerry and the PC synchronized, all of a sudden it thinks it needs to update *every* single file. Since I have about 5 GB of data (mostly music), this would take an hour or more. And don't forget the hour to do it again when I travel to another city, and then another hour when I get home.

[Branta]

I'm glad you found my Time Zones Implementation thread useful. Thanks to sunkast for the link. I've just updated it with a link to new posts by royhiggs. Roy explains the "why" behind the implementation, and points to the solution.

The way Outlook corrupts all-day appointments is especially frustrating to me. At least Outlook 2007 has time zone drop down selectors, so that will help that problem.

The general TZ implementation used by RIM seems quite rational.

Concur on the wish for a 'no time zone' option for events which should be performed at the same Local time every day, like 'go to lunch'. There's no way I want to fly from UK to California and get a lunch reminder at 5am.

Now my wishlist for system time configuration...
Add: option for daylight saving, Auto/On/Off
Add: free format time zone so I can set as UTC +/-hh:mm (rather than city names which I can't always link to the TZ I know I'm in)
When that is implemented, Add: Time from GPS.

GPS time might require a stability filter, maybe 'n' good satellites and stable time for 'n2' seconds, and/or max 10 seconds permitted change without confirmation - the BB should never drift more than a few seconds before correcting once it is set. In an ideal world the BB internal clock could probably be disciplined from GPS to eliminate drift, but that's probably going a bit too far.

Comments?

[BruceRTL]

My issues are further complicated by the fact that I live in Arizona. We don't change our clocks for day light savings time. I have told my BB that my timezone is "Arizona" not "Mountain". (at least we get our own timezone)

I travel to NY a lot and right now it's 3 hours difference, but in a couple of weeks after the time changes, it will only be 2 hours difference. I will be back to NY during the week of November 17th with meetings Mon - Fri from 8am till 5pm.

Can someone verify that I have set this up correctly?
I have loaded the meeting times in Outlook as 8am till 5pm eastern.
It seems like they have transfered to both my Google Calendar and BlackBerry correctly and are showing in AZ time as 6am till 3pm.

Once I get to Albany, I will change my phone to eastern time. Will the appointments then show up in the correct times slots - 8am till 5pm?

[jeffh]

My issues are further complicated by the fact that I live in Arizona. We don't change our clocks for day light savings time. I have told my BB that my timezone is "Arizona" not "Mountain". (at least we get our own timezone)

I travel to NY a lot and right now it's 3 hours difference, but in a couple of weeks after the time changes, it will only be 2 hours difference. I will be back to NY during the week of November 17th with meetings Mon - Fri from 8am till 5pm.

Can someone verify that I have set this up correctly?
I have loaded the meeting times in Outlook as 8am till 5pm eastern.
It seems like they have transfered to both my Google Calendar and BlackBerry correctly and are showing in AZ time as 6am till 3pm.

Once I get to Albany, I will change my phone to eastern time. Will the appointments then show up in the correct times slots - 8am till 5pm?

Yes. You have entered your NY appointments in Eastern Time, so when you change your time zone on arrrival in NY, the times will be correct in ET. If you haven't already, I'd encourage you to read my Time Zone Issues thread that's linked in my sig. It gives other worked out examples, and answers common time zone questions.

[CanuckBB]

I just change the time to the local time and ignore TZ altogether.