Question

Command Line Time Zone Change

Asked by: mr_kev

I work for a restuarant chain with XP pro as servers and Windows 98 clients for cash registers in each location. Most of these are remote and I need a way to change the time zone from Indiana East to Eastern Standard time, without visiting each computer. I have found utilities for nt based machines but not 98. Also I can connect remotely to the servers with PCanywhere. Thanks in advance.

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Asked On
2006-03-20 at 15:29:52ID21781631
Tags

command

,

line

,

time

,

zone

,

windows

Topic

Windows 98 Operating System

Participating Experts
2
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300
Comments
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Answers

 

by: dbruntonPosted on 2006-03-20 at 23:28:15ID: 16244536

Well, see here

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/221542/

This is the location of the Time Zone information in the registry that's being used.  All you have to do is change it. That's where the problem start.

Here

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=317211

Shows you how to edit the Time Zone information for each country and will show you where in the registry it is..  The trick is to get the information for your region in this area into the location of the Time Zone information that's being used.

 

by: BillDLPosted on 2006-03-20 at 23:29:54ID: 16244543

From what I can determine, these settings are stored in the registry.
The following two examples shows the differences when I changed from GMT to US Eastern Standard Time using the traditional Tim/Date Control Panel Applet and just accessed the "Time Zone" Drop-Down list:

BEFORE
------

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\TimeZoneInformation]
"ActiveTimeBias"=hex:00,00,00,00
"StandardName"="GMT Standard Time"
"DaylightName"="GMT Daylight Time"
"Bias"=hex:00,00,00,00
"StandardBias"=hex:00,00,00,00
"DaylightBias"=hex:c4,ff,ff,ff
"StandardStart"=hex:00,00,0a,00,00,00,05,00,02,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"DaylightStart"=hex:00,00,03,00,00,00,05,00,01,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"DaylightFlag"=hex:01,00,00,00
"ActiveTime"=hex:97,85,ff,ff

AFTER
-----

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\TimeZoneInformation]
"ActiveTimeBias"=hex:2c,01,00,00
"StandardName"="US Eastern Standard Time"
"DaylightName"="US Eastern Daylight Time"
"Bias"=hex:2c,01,00,00
"StandardBias"=hex:00,00,00,00
"DaylightBias"=hex:c4,ff,ff,ff
"StandardStart"=hex:00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"DaylightStart"=hex:00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"DaylightFlag"=hex:01,00,00,00
"ActiveTime"=hex:97,85,ff,ff

Note: the following values were unaffected, but have been included for completeness:

"StandardBias"=
"DaylightBias"=
"DaylightFlag"=
"ActiveTime"=

The results do not require a restart, and I'm sure that they could be easily applied by running a .REG Script or using Remote Registry Server as an administrator.

What this DOESN'T DO is actually change the system time.  I don't know of a way to do this other than from the Time?Date Control panel Applet or using DOS commands:

Echo 15.30.00 | Time
Echo 21/03/2006 | Date

or

TIME 15.30.00
DATE 21/03/2006

There is probably a Visual Basic or Windows Script that could change the Time Zone AND the system time elegantly and in one pass, but I'm not a programmer.

As far as tools to change the time zone, I don't know of any.  The nearest Win98 gets is a tool to create your own custom time zones CD:\tools\reskit\config\tzedit.exe

 

by: dbruntonPosted on 2006-03-20 at 23:32:52ID: 16244550

This link shows you how to activate the various applets in the Control Panel.

You could call up the Date/Time applet and change the items that way.

http://www.robvanderwoude.com/index.html

 

by: BillDLPosted on 2006-03-20 at 23:47:58ID: 16244619

Hmmm, just nipped in ahead of mine there dbrunton :-)

You might be able to add a command to the one of the "RunOnce" registry keys eg:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce
causing regedit to run a batch file to change the Time & Date and then call regedit to import a .REG file the first time the system is rebooted:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=137367

 

by: BillDLPosted on 2006-03-20 at 23:55:07ID: 16244653

Rob van der Woude's pages are annoying the way they load in a frame and you can't get the url to return to the exact page.  I think this is the RunDLL command you were referring to dbrunton:

Date/Time Properties:
    rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL timedate.cpl

Pick a Time Zone Dialog (Doesn't work for me, just shows the same dialog):
    rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL timedate.cpl,,/f

 

by: dbruntonPosted on 2006-03-21 at 00:23:38ID: 16244758

Yep

You would then need to pass keystrokes to the GUI to get it to do the job.  I remember using a util from one of the PC mags to do this, it was a 16 bit app that I can't remember the name of.

Trouble is you have to install an app, hmm these are 98 machines connected to servers so they should be able to access an app installed on a server.

There's Winbatch and others that could do the keystroke task.

 

by: BillDLPosted on 2006-03-21 at 00:59:42ID: 16244906

mr kev
Can you access the registries of each of the terminals on your network remotely?

I can't recall, but I think the remote Win98 terminals have to be running the remote registry service (CD:\tools\reskit\netadmin\remotreg\regserv.exe) to enable registry access from a remote network source.
As you may conclude, networking is not my strong point, so I would welcome contradiction with this one :-)

There are other 3rd-party utilities that allow you to take over the remote computer as though it was your own, but they also normally have to have a client service running on the remote computers to work.

 

by: BillDLPosted on 2006-04-26 at 01:54:59ID: 16541964

Thank you LeeTutor and GranMod

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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