Effects of 2007 Daylight Saving Time Changes on Sun's Web Tier Products

The U.S. Energy Policy Act of 2005 mandates that, effective as of 2007, Daylight Saving Time (DST) in the United States will begin on the second Sunday of March and end on the first Sunday of November. Before, DST started on the first Sunday of April and ended on the last Sunday of October.

The U.S. system time for operating systems and applications that comply with the old rules will be incorrect. Typically, C and C++ applications obtain the system time through OS system calls; Java applications, through the Java Development Kit (JDK).
 
Vendors for both the OS and the JDK will release patches with the necessary fixes.

Canada and Bermuda will follow the U.S. rules. It is recommended that users who reside in the unaffected countries install the related patches anyway. Why? Because applications in those countries could programmatically switch to other time zones to meet application-specific configuration or computation needs; those time zones might well comply with the new DST rules.

Go to the following sites:

• Solaris OS
• HP-UX
• IBM AIX
• Microsoft Windows
• Red Hat Linux

First, see the BigAdmin DST site and read the article U.S. Daylight Saving Time Changes in 2007. Go to the following sites for the patches:

• Solaris OS, Windows, and Linux
  • Java 2 Platform, Standard Edition (J2SE) 5.0, update 6 or later and Java SE 6 platform or later versions
  • Java Platform, Standard Edition, (J2SE) 1.4.2_11 or later versions
  • J2SE 1.3.1_18 or later versions
• HP-UX
• IBM AIX

Sun Java System Web Server (henceforth, Web Server) derives its time information—for example, the log-file time stamps—from both the OS system calls and the JDK. In addition, any Java Web applications that run on the Web Server instances and that use the system time information might be affected by the new DST rules. Be sure to apply the appropriate OS patches. Administration Server users must also upgrade the JDK.
 
Here are the DST-related specifics on the Web Server releases:

• Web Server 6.0 SP11 bundles Java Runtime Environment (JRE) 1.2.2. No DST-compliant patches are available for that JRE release for any platform. To comply with the new DST rules, upgrade the JRE for your platform (see the next paragraph).
   
  For AIX platforms, download the latest JRE 1.3.1 patch from the IBM site. For HP-UX, download the patch from the HP site. For all other platforms, download the JRE 1.4.2_13 patches from the Sun site (see the pointers in the preceding Q&A).
   
  For more details, see the Web Server 6.0 SP11 Release Notes.
   
  
• In February 2007, Sun will release Web Server 6.1 SP7, which bundles DST- compliant JDK 1.4.2_13 on Solaris OS, Windows, and Linux. On HP-UX and AIX, instead of bundling a JDK, Web Server 6.1 SP7 will be certified with a DST-compliant JDK. Download that JDK from the HP or IBM site. For details, see the Web Server 6.1 SP7 Release Notes.
   
  Announcements on Web Server 6.1 SP will be posted on the Web Server Developer Forum and the download site.
   
  
• Web Server 7.0 bundles JDK 1.5 update 9, which contains the DST-related fixes on Solaris OS, Windows, and Linux. In addition, Web Server 7.0 is certified for JDK 1.6, which likewise contains DST-related fixes. For details, see the Web Server 7.0 documentation.
   
  On HP-UX, Web Server 7.0 does not bundle the JDK. Be sure to download the JDK from the HP site.

Sun Java System Web Proxy Server (henceforth, Web Proxy Server) 3.6.x does not require JRE. Do download the OS patch upgrade, such as that for version 4.0.x, however.
 
Note: For Web Proxy Server 4.0.x, you need JRE for the Administration Server only.
 
For Web Proxy Server 4.0.x, upgrade to the upcoming 4.0.4 release, which will ship around the same time as Sun Java Enterprise System 5. Web Proxy Server 4.0.4 bundles DST-compliant JRE 1.4.2_13 on Solaris OS, Windows, and Linux. On HP-UX, Web Proxy Server will be certified with a DST-compliant JRE. For details, see the Web Proxy Server 4.0.4 Release Notes.
 
Announcements on Web Server 4.0.4 will be posted on the Web Proxy Server Developer Forum and the product site.
 
As components of Sun Java Enterprise System 5, both Web Proxy Server 4.0.4 and Web Server 7.0 are bundled with a DST-compliant JDK and JRE 1.5, hence not affected by the DST changes.

The DST changes do not affect the Web Server plug-ins, only Web Server itself. Still, you must download the OS patches. For the Web applications that run on Web Server, download the appropriate JDK.

Yes, but restart the daemon only after you have applied the OS patches and ensured that the server.xml file specifies a DST-compliant JDK or JRE. For details, see the Installation and Migration Guide for the product version in question.