In August of 2005, the United States Congress passed the Energy Policy Act, which changed the dates of both the start and end of Daylight Saving Time (DST). Beginning this year, DST starts three weeks earlier (2:00 A.M. on March 11) and ends one week later (2:00 A.M. November 4) than what had traditionally occurred.

All computers and time-dependent systems which have been designed to automatically adjust for DST must be updated to properly reflect changes in the DST schedule.

What We Are Doing

Workstations

A Windows patch will be applied to all University-owned workstations. This patch will ensure that each workstation changes to DST properly and will be applied to your workstation the next time you log in. You do not have to take any other action. (Computer lab workstations will not be patched at this time.)

Starting Monday, March 12, if you notice any University-owned individual workstations without the correct time, please contact the Help Desk at ext 5302 and be ready to give the location and name of the computer. An incorrect time does not interfere with the use of the workstation.

GroupWise

Behind the scenes, a process will be run on the GroupWise system to attempt to adjust appointments affected by the time change. As a result of this process, you will see two new folders in your GroupWise Cabinet folder - "TZChange2007 adjusted" and "TZChange2007 not adjusted". These folders display appointments you have sent or received that were either adjusted or not adjusted by the process.

What You Should Do

Workstations

To make sure your home computer or dorm computer has the Windows DST patch, visit http://www.microsoft.com/dst2007 to run a check and install the patch if still needed.

Mac users can visit http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305056.

GroupWise

GroupWise appointments that fall between 3/11- 4/1 and 10/28-11/4 may be off by an hour. Here are some things you can do to minimize confusion during the affected date ranges:

• Consider any appointments that fall into these date ranges as suspect until you communicate with all meeting invitees to make sure that the item shows up correctly on everyone's calendar, both internally and externally.
  
• Include the time of the meeting in the subject line or message body of the appointment so that invitees can double-check the correct meeting time. (i.e. "Staff Meeting - 11:00am Central Time")
  
• Exercise caution with the appointments and meetings in the extended DST period. When in doubt, verify the correct time with the meeting organizer.

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