-A @dfn{time zone item} specifies an international time zone, indicated by
-a small set of letters. They are supported for backward compatibility reasons,
-but they are not recommended because they are ambiguous in practice:
-for example, the abbreviation @samp{EST} has different meanings in
-Australia and the United States. Any included period is ignored. Military
-time zone designations use a single letter. Currently, only integral
-zone hours may be represented in a time zone item. See the previous
-section for a finer control over the time zone correction.
-
-Here are many non-daylight-saving-time time zones, indexed by the zone
-hour value.
-
-@table @asis
-@item -1200
-@samp{Y} for militaries.
-@item -1100
-@samp{X} for militaries.
-@item -1000
-@samp{W} for militaries.
-@item -0900
-@samp{V} for militaries.
-@item -0800
-@samp{PST} for Pacific Standard, and
-@samp{U} for militaries.
-@item -0700
-@samp{MST} for Mountain Standard, and
-@samp{T} for militaries.
-@item -0600
-@samp{CST} for Central Standard, and
-@samp{S} for militaries.
-@item -0500
-@samp{EST} for Eastern Standard, and
-@samp{R} for militaries.
-@item -0400
-@samp{AST} for Atlantic Standard, and
-@samp{Q} for militaries.
-@item -0300
-@samp{P} for militaries.
-@item -0200
-@samp{O} for militaries.
-@item -0100
-@samp{N} for militaries.
-@item +0000
-@cindex Greenwich Mean Time
-@cindex Coordinated Universal Time
-@cindex Universal Coordinated Time
-@cindex Universal Time (Coordinated)
-@samp{GMT} for Greenwich Mean,
-@samp{UT} for Universal,
-@samp{UTC} for Coordinated Universal,
-@samp{WET} for Western European, and
-@samp{Z} for ISO 8601 and militaries.
-@item +0100
-@samp{A} for militaries,
-@samp{CET} for Central European,
-@samp{MET} for Midden Europesche Tijd (Dutch), and
-@samp{MEZ} for Mittel-Europ@"aische Zeit (German).
-@item +0200
-@samp{B} for militaries, and
-@samp{EET} for Eastern European.
-@item +0300
-@samp{C} for militaries.
-@item +0400
-@samp{D} for militaries.
-@item +0500
-@samp{E} for militaries.
-@item +0600
-@samp{F} for militaries.
-@item +0700
-@samp{G} for militaries.
-@item +0800
-@samp{H} for militaries.
-@item +0900
-@samp{I} for militaries, and
-@samp{JST} for Japan Standard.
-@item +1000
-@samp{GST} for Guam Standard, and
-@samp{K} for militaries.
-@item +1100
-@samp{L} for militaries.
-@item +1200
-@samp{M} for militaries, and
-@samp{NZST} for New Zealand Standard.
-@end table
-
-@cindex daylight-saving time
-Here are many daylight-saving time (DST) time zones,
-indexed by the zone hour value. Also, by
-following a non-DST time zone by the string @samp{DST} in a separate word
-(that is, separated by some whitespace), the corresponding DST time zone
-may be specified.
-
-@table @asis
-@item -0700
-@samp{PDT} for Pacific Daylight.
-@item -0600
-@samp{MDT} for Mountain Daylight.
-@item -0500
-@samp{CDT} for Central Daylight.
-@item -0400
-@samp{EDT} for Eastern Daylight.
-@item -0300
-@samp{ADT} for Atlantic Daylight.
-@item +0100
-@samp{BST} for British Summer, and
-@samp{WEST} for Western European Summer.
-@item +0200
-@samp{CEST} for Central European Summer,
-@samp{MEST} for Midden Europesche S. Tijd (Dutch), and
-@samp{MESZ} for Mittel-Europ@"aische Sommerzeit (German).
-@item +1300
-@samp{NZDT} for New Zealand Daylight.
-@end table
+A @dfn{time zone item} specifies an international time zone, indicated
+by a small set of letters, e.g., @samp{UTC} or @samp{Z}
+for Coordinated Universal
+Time. Any included periods are ignored. By following a
+non-daylight-saving time zone by the string @samp{DST} in a separate
+word (that is, separated by some white space), the corresponding
+daylight saving time zone may be specified.
+
+Time zone items other than @samp{UTC} and @samp{Z}
+are obsolescent and are not recommended, because they
+are ambiguous; for example, @samp{EST} has a different meaning in
+Australia than in the United States. Instead, it's better to use
+unambiguous numeric time zone corrections like @samp{-0500}, as
+described in the previous section.