set timestamp oddness

not sure what it's supposed to look like, but i'm reasonably
sure 'show time zone' shouldn't produce this--

db=# set timezone = '-6';
SET
db=# show timezone;
TimeZone
----------------
-00:00:00.0216
(1 row)

very odd, that!

i'm using

$ psql -V
psql (PostgreSQL) 7.4.2
contains support for command-line editing

on my debian/sarge (testing) system.

db=# set timezone to '-5:00';
ERROR: unrecognized time zone name: "-5:00"

pooh. but this works, of course:

hits=# set timezone = 'America/Chicago';
SET
hits=# show timezone;
TimeZone
-----------------
America/Chicago
(1 row)

(or anything else under /usr/share/zoneinfo...)

also--

db=# select now() at time zone 'America/Chicago';
ERROR: time zone "america/chicago" not recognized

doesn't that conflict with the "set" command above? is there a
good reason for the syntax of the timezone to be different here?

db=# select now() at time zone '-5';
ERROR: time zone "-5" not recognized

also in conflict with what 'set time zone' accepts...

db=# select now() at time zone 'GMT-5';
ERROR: time zone "gmt-5" not recognized

oh well, it was worth a shot.

but then:

db=# select now() at time zone 'CDT';
timezone
----------------------------
2004-04-05 16:26:49.991342
(1 row)

the one that "set time zone" does NOT accept, "at time zone" DOES.
hmm?

--
"Why did they hard code that value into the program?".
"My only guess would be to maximize suckage."
http://suso.suso.org/docs/apache_and_frontpage/htmldocs/part4-2.phtml