Classic user developer impedance mismatch. =)
I agree that Python should guard its users against crazy standards that creep into standard lib, because nobody had time to think about pythonic API.
I propose the following change:
http://docs.python.org/library/time.html#time.altzone
- UTC offset of the local DST timezone if one is defined. Only use this if daylight is nonzero.
+ UTC offset of the current timezone with Daylight Savings Time (DST) correction. To check if DST is currently active, use `time.localtime(t).tm_isdst`
http://docs.python.org/library/time.html#time.daylight
- Nonzero if a DST timezone is defined.
+ Flag indicating that current timezone has Daylight Savings Time (DST) offset. To check if DST is currently active, use `time.localtime(t).tm_isdst`
http://docs.python.org/library/time.html#time.timezone
- UTC offset of the local (non-DST) timezone
+ UTC offset of the current timezone. It doesn't include Daylight Savings Time (DST) correction. See `time.altzone` for that.
BTW, isn't the following check redundant?
if time.localtime(t).tm_isdst and time.daylight: