# timezone

The `timezone` object, as its name suggests, describes timezones. Currently, they are used by message parser modules to interpret timestamps that contain timezone information via a timezone string (but not an offset, e.g. “CET” but not “-01:00”). The object describes an UTC offset for a given timezone ID.

Each timestamp object adds the zone definition to a global table with timezone information. Duplicate IDs are forbidden, but the same offset may be used with multiple IDs.

As with other configuration objects, parameters for this object are case-insensitive.

## Parameters

`id <name-string>`

  Mandatory

  This identifies the timezone. Note that this id must match the zone name as reported within the timestamps. Different devices and vendors use different, often non-standard, names and so it is important to use the actual ids that messages contain. For multiple devices, this may mean that you may need to include multiple definitions, each one with a different id, for the same time zone. For example, it is seen that some devices report “CEST” for central European daylight savings time while others report “METDST” for it.

`offset <[+/-]><hh>:<mm>`

  Mandatory

  This defines the timezone offset over UTC. It must always be 6 characters and start with a “+” (east of UTC) or “-” (west uf UTC) followed by a two-digit hour offset, a colon and a two-digit minute offset. Hour offsets can be in the range from zero to twelve, minute offsets in the range from zero to 59. Any other format is invalid.

## Sample

The following sample defines UTC time. From rsyslog PoV, it doesn’t matter if a plus or minus offset prefix is used. For consistency, plus is suggested.

    timezone(id="UTC" offset="+00:00")

The next sample defines some common timezones:

    timezone(id="CET" offset="+01:00")
    timezone(id="CEST" offset="+02:00")
    timezone(id="METDST" offset="+02:00") # duplicate to support differnt formats
    timezone(id="EST" offset="-05:00")
    timezone(id="EDT" offset="-04:00")
    timezone(id="PST" offset="-08:00")
    timezone(id="PDT" offset="-07:00")