timezone.system

Parameters

Behavior

Check

1. Runs timedatectl show --property=Timezone --value and trims whitespace.
2. If timedatectl fails (not available), falls back to reading /etc/timezone.
3. Compares to the desired timezone. Match → NeedsChange: false; otherwise NeedsChange: true.

Apply

1. Reads current timezone before making changes (stored for Revert).
2. Runs timedatectl set-timezone <timezone>.
3. If timedatectl fails, writes <timezone> to /etc/timezone and runs dpkg-reconfigure -f noninteractive tzdata.
4. If utc: true, additionally runs timedatectl set-local-rtc 0.

Revert

Restores the timezone that was active before Apply ran by calling timedatectl set-timezone <previousTZ>. If Apply was never called, Revert is a no-op (previous timezone is unknown).

Examples

# Set timezone to UTC
UTC:
  timezone.system: []

# Set a regional timezone and sync hardware clock
America/Chicago:
  timezone.system:
    - utc: true
    - require:
      - pkg.installed:tzdata

# Use explicit name parameter
system-timezone:
  timezone.system:
    - name: Europe/Berlin

Notes

• Timezone strings must match entries in the IANA Time Zone Database (e.g. America/New_York, not EST).
• On systems without timedatectl (non-systemd), the fallback writes /etc/timezone and invokes dpkg-reconfigure tzdata. The dpkg-reconfigure binary must be available.
• The utc parameter only affects the hardware clock setting, not the timezone string itself.