2007 U.S. Daylight-Saving Time (DST) Extension

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

Extended daylight-saving time (DST) in the United States will begin in March 2007, to comply with the Energy Policy Act of 2005. Spring forward will start three weeks earlier (March 11th, at 2:00 a.m.), and fall back from DST will start on November 4th at 2:00 a.m.

Environment

VMware ESX Server 2.5.x
VMware ESX Server 3.0.x
VMware ESX Server 2.1.x

Resolution

VMware has produced an update for the following products affected by the new United States daylight-saving time (DST) change:

• VMware ESX Server 2.x
• VMware ESX Server 3.0.x

The update has been incorporated into the following product releases:

• VMware ESX Server 2.0.2 Upgrade Patch 3 (build 33518 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 2.1.3 Upgrade Patch 3 (build 33524 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 2.5.3 Upgrade Patch 5 (build 34512 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 2.5.4 and later (build 32233 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 3.0.0 and later (build 27701 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 3.0.1 and later (build 32039 or later)

The ESX Server downloads pages are at:

• http://www.vmware.com/download/esx/ (for ESX Server 2.x)
• http://www.vmware.com/download/vi/ (for ESX Server 3.x)

VMware recommends upgrading to a supported version of ESX Server. Patches are available from the respective download pages.

Checking an ESX Server host for installed updates:

ESX Server 2.x patches are cumulative and are referenced by the build number. The current build number is listed in the management interface (MUI), or in the display using VirtualCenter 1.x. Optionally log on to the service console and use the command vmware –v. For example:

[root@esxhost]# vmware -v
VMware ESX Server 2.5.1 build-14182

To check for installed bundles on an ESX Server 3.x host, use the command esxupdate on the service console. For details about esxupdate, reference the VMware Technical Note “Patch Management for ESX Server 3” at http://www.vmware.com/pdf/esx3_esxupdate.pdf .

Confirming timezone updates contain new DST data:

After the system has been upgraded to a patch with timezone changes, make sure /etc/localtime reflects the changes using the following steps:

1. Check that the zoneinfo file for the ESX Server host location has the correct changes reflecting the new DST dates:
   
   [root@esxhost]# zdump -v /usr/share/zoneinfo/<specific zoneinfo file> | grep 2007
   
   
2. Compare the output from step 1 to what is currently in /etc/localtime:
   
   [root@esxhost]# zdump -v /etc/localtime | grep 2007
   
   
3. If the output from /etc/localtime is not correct, copy the specific zoneinfo file from /usr/share/zoneinfo to /etc/localtime.
   
   [root@esxhost]# cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/<specific zoneinfo file> /etc/localtime
   
   If prompted to overwrite /etc/localtime, type yes.
   
   
4. Check that /etc/localtime has the correct DST timezone dates.
   
   [root@esxhost]# zdump -v /etc/localtime | grep 2007
   
   
5. After updating /etc/localtime, you must reboot the ESX Server host so that all system logger services will use the correct date and time in log output files. Shut down or suspend any running virtual machines, and then reboot the host.
   

Workaround for ESX 2.x only:

VMware has made an update package available that will update the time zone files only. This update package is designed as a workaround to give customers additional time to upgrade their VMware ESX servers to a supported version. The update package should be installed only by customers who are absolutely not able to install the full patch by March 11. This update package contains new timezone data files with the new DST settings, which will be copied to /usr/share/zoneinfo.

Important: You must reboot the ESX Server host after applying these updates so the system logger services will use the new date and time.

The update package for ESX 2.0.2, 2.1.3, 2.5.0, 2.5.1, 2.5.2 and 2.5.3 is available in the attached gziped tarfile tzdata-new.gz :

To install the package, follow the steps below:

1. Download the tar file and save it as tzdata-new.gz in the /tmp directory on the service console.
   
   
2. Extract the tar file in /tmp:
   
   [root@esxhost]# cd /tmp
   [root@esxhost]# tar zxvf tzdata-new.gz
   
   
3. Check /etc/sysconfig/clock to ensure the ESX Server host is configured for the correct timezone location:
   
   [root@esxhost]# cat /etc/sysconfig/clock
   
   Sample output:
   
   ZONE="America/Los_Angeles"
   UTC=true
   ARC=false
   
   If the line for ZONE= is not correct, edit /etc/sysconfig/clock to replace the string with the correct zone from /usr/share/zoneinfo.
   
   
4. Execute the perl script to install the time zone files:
   
   [root@esxhost] # /tmp/time-zone/tz-update.pl
   
   
5. Follow the steps in Confirming timezone updates contain new DST data (above) to verify /etc/localtime reflects the changes.
   
   
6. Shut down or suspend any running virtual machines then reboot the ESX Server host so that all system logger services will be refreshed to use the correct date and time in log output files.