The Australian timezone names on many Unix-like systems are missing the 'A' at the start. It's AEST, not EST. AWST, not WST. The existing timezone data makes no distinction between standard time and daylight saving time, eg. AEST vs. AEDT — it calls them both EST. This needs to be fixed.
There is currently a patch for the tzdata source. This is used in the packages below.
Selected links on the topic:
You can download addon tzdata-au packages that replace the system's Australian zoneinfo files.
Alternatively I have set up an Apt repository with Debian &
Ubuntu tzdata-au packages with the timezone patch.
You can get them by downloading the
Debian
or Ubuntu repository
file and saving it in /etc/apt/sources.list.d and
running aptitude install tzdata-au . The
packages are signed using my GPG key which you can import by running
wget -O- http://tedp.id.au/~ted/ddd11d8a.asc | sudo apt-key add
- .
The packages only replace the Australian timezone info, that way you can continue to upgrade the system tzdata package to stay up-to-date with worldwide timezone changes — tzdata-au only needs to be updated if there are changes to the Australian timezones.
I've heard that the upstream maintainers (on the elusive tz@elsie.nci.nih.gov mailing list) are not inclined to accept this change because of a combination of misinformation and inertia. I would really like this to be fixed upstream, but for now I don't have the energy to pursue it.
— Ted Percival (contact). tedp.id.au