Help understanding registry entries

[presto]

In another post I asked for help in how to have my clock ALWAYS one minute fast. What I want to do is to have it synchronize with internet servers every so often but always set the clock ahead by one minute (or whatever I want).

I think I've figured out how to do it. I found in the registry where all the time zones are. You can tell your computer what time zone to use. I want to create a new time zone and call it US Eastern Time Plus. The problem is I don't know how the numbers work in the registry. It seems that by looking at the entry that tells you the offset (i.e GMT-5 hours) and then looking at the set of numbers at the bottom I should be able to figure out how to create what I want. The problem is I'm not familiar with the number system used in the registry.

Can anyone help me decipher these numbers and create custome time zone? Am I wrong to think this can be done?

Thanks

[gmatov]

This may be too simple, but why don't you just check your time weekly, and make sure it is a minute fast?

On the other end, what if it runs up to the hour, you lose the last minute.

[presto]

This may be too simple, but why don't you just check your time weekly, and make sure it is a minute fast?

My question is how to do this automatically. Of course I know I can do it by occasionally resetting the time. I'm not claiming the earth will open up and destroy us all if I can't do this. It's just something that would be nice.

On the other end, what if it runs up to the hour, you lose the last minute.

Almost all the shows that I've taped start right on schedule but end a couple of minutes early.

[Solarjetman]

I have some experience hacking registry entries. Can you tell me what key you are looking at so I can see what it looks like?

[presto]

Thanks, run regedit and do a search for "US Eastern". You will find that time zone and all the others. I probably want to copy "US Eastern" somehow and then change it.

It looks to me like all the data is contained in the thing called TZI which is just a long string of numbers and letters (hex notation I guess).

Looks like the key is

hkey local machine/software/microsoft/windows/current version/time zones

If I read it correctly

[Solarjetman]

OK, I think I have a crack for you.

create a text file and name it "US Eastern Plus.reg"

Have it contain the following text, just as I have it typed...

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Time Zones\Eastern Standard Time Plus]
"Display"="(GMT-04:59) Eastern Time Plus (Non-Standard)"
"Dlt"="Eastern Daylight Time Plus"
"Std"="Eastern Standard Time Plus"
"MapID"="38,39"
"Index"=dword:00000023
"TZI"=hex:2b,01,00,00,00,00,00,00,c4,ff,ff,ff,00,00,0a,00,00,00,05,00,02,00,00,\
  00,00,00,00,00,00,00,04,00,00,00,01,00,02,00,00,00,00,00,00,00

Then, merge the file with your registry. That should add Eastern Standard Time Plus as a choice.

And It should correct itself even with daylight time changes.

Make dure you get that last blank line in the file.

EDIT: you may have to change the value of "index" to a unique number from all the others, I am not sure about that one.

[presto]

Thanks,
I'll try it and let you know. I've never merged anything with my registry. I'll see if I can figure out how to do that. Don't worry, I know to back up my registry first.

Also making it one minute fast was only one possibility. I might end up wanting it to be 30 seconds or 15 seconds. Can you explain how I can make it any number I want or is it too complicated for someone who doesn't do much with the registry? If it's too hard to explain, maybe you could do another one for me that is 15 seconds fast, that's the one I think I will most likely end up using.

Thanks Again for taking the time to help

[presto]

Worked perfectly! Again if you can explain how I can do this it would be cool but if not I could use the following:

1) Eastern Time plus 5 minutes (for my friend who likes his clocks to all be five minutes fast for some reason)

2) Eastern Time minus 5 minutes (I'm not sure if he likes it 5 minutes fast or 5 minutes slow. )

3) Eastern Time plus 15 seconds (This is the one I need the most)

[Solarjetman]

I might end up wanting it to be 30 seconds or 15 seconds.

That is not possible. The resistry sets the time based on minutes not seconds.

The TZI is as follows..

AA AA AA AA BB BB BB BB CC CC CC CC ........

The A's represent the normal offset from Grenwich mean time in minutes (that is why seconds are not possible)

The B's represent the bias applied to the standard offset during standard daylight time

The C's represent the bias applied to the stanard offset during daylight savings time

The numbers after that are the days on wich standard time and daylight savings time begin and end.

All numbers are represneted in Little-Endian notation (meaning the numbers within the group of two numbers are read left to right, but the groups themselves are read right to left.

Example:
the number 5a 41 00 00
is written out as 0x0000415a

Also, I want to thank you, that was a fun project for me. Even though I was able to decode the TZI entry, I do not know what the Index entry is used for. I am assuming it is supposed to be a unique identifier, so you may have to change it.

If you can't merge the file, or it does not work right when mergining the file, the only thing required to make it work is change the first "c" to a "b" in your US Eastern Time. That reduces the offset by one minute. I tired to make a new entery so you could switch between the two if need.

[presto]

Ok, The one minute one will be fine. Thanks again. It seems to work perfectly. It's really neat to see that new entry in there.

Have you ever made a plug in for X-Setup? It's a free program that let's you tweak registry settings. People contribute plug ins that do various things. I looked through and didn't see anything like this. Maybe others would find it useful.

Thanks

[Solarjetman]

No problem. I just re-read my post, I did not make that too clear did I?

I will show you with the Eastern time zone entry...
the first part of the TZI is 2c 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 c4 ff ff ff

Lets seperate them into the 3 sections
A = 2c 01 00 00
B = 00 00 00 00
C = c4 ff ff ff

Now lets transfer them into "human hex" numbers
A = 0x0000012C
B = 0x00000000
C = 0xFFFFFFC4

Now lets turn them into normal people numbers (i.e. decimal)
A = 300
B = 0
C = -60

Now the eastern time zone is 5 hours from greenwich mean time. That is 300 minutes which is the value of A

During standard time, we do not want to modify the offset from GMT. So wee need to put 0 in B

During daylight savings time, the Eastern time zone is 60 minutes closer to GMT. So we need to subtract 60 minutes from the offset. So we put -60 in C

And really, that is all there is to it.

Ladies and Gentleman, that is your hacking lesson for the day

[Solarjetman]

It seems to work perfectly. It's really neat to see that new entry in there.

Woot!

Have you ever made a plug in for X-Setup? It's a free program that let's you tweak registry settings.

No I haven't. In fact I have never heard of X-Setup. This would be kinda neat. And it would be so simple to program.

[presto]

I think you will like X-setup. One thing I really like is you can record the changes you make to one computer and create a file that you can take to all your other computers and apply those same registry changes. Look at the second link on that page and you will see the info on creating your own plug in (a bit of immortality)

The Eastern Time +1 minute hack works for me but Eastern Time + 15 secs would be better. As you pointed out it can't be done by creating a new time zone. Do you know if there is just a command that I can execute that will advance the clock 15 secs? I could then set that to execute whenever the system updates the time. Maybe I could "hook" them togethor. I'm going to hunt around for such a thing but any help is appreciated.

[Solarjetman]

Well, making a program that sets the clock forward 15 seconds would not be hard, but I don't really know how to tie it to the time update. You could have it run once a week and start it right after an update. Since the updates happen once a week, that may work.