Timezone Data Import
Softdial Campaign Manager™ makes use of two files:
- legislatures.xml
- statecodes.xml
to define valid calling times for specific records based on their local timezone and legislation.
Softdial Campaign Manager™ uses the information in these files during pre-processing to create upperbound and lowerbound field data. (For more details, see Time Zone Pre-Processing)
legislatures.xml - a map of Call Time Bound to State/Area Code
legislatures.xml resides in the same directory as the Softdial Campaign Manager™ server executable. A version of this file (for example purposes only) is provided with Softdial Campaign Manager™. Users should configure this file, adding records as required.
<Legislatures>
<default lowerbound="0.333333" upperbound="0.875" /> <!-- Everything not listed below : 8am to 9pm-->
<legislature code="CA" lowerbound="0.458333" upperbound="0.833333" /> <!-- California : 11am to 8pm-->
<legislature code="TX" lowerbound="0.625" upperbound="0.708333" /> <!-- Texas : 3pm to 5pm-->
</Legislatures>
This file is in standard XML format. Typically, the <Legislatures> tag surrounds an optional series of <legislature> tags, and an optional <default> tag.
A <legislature> tag has the following properties:
| Property | Present in <default>? | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| code | No, because it covers every location that is not specified by a <legislature> tag. | The geographic location (e.g. state code) for which the rest of the properties of the tag pertain. This code is cross referenced in the statecodes.xml file. See below. |
| lowerbound | Yes | The time beyond which a call to the location can be made on a given day. The number is in fractions of 1 day, where 0 represents midnight in local time. For example, midday is represented by 0.5. |
| upperbound | Yes | The time beyond which a call to the location cannot be made on a given day. |
statecodes.xml - a map of Time Zone / DST to State/ Area Code, Postcode and Area Code
statecodes.xml is also found in the same directory as the Softdial Campaign Manager™ server executable and the file above. A version of this file (for example purposes only) is provided with the Softdial Campaign Manager™. A much cut down version is shown here for reference:
<Postcodes>
<postcode code="92274" areacode="760" legislature="CA" timezone="-8" DST="Y" /> <!-- 100 Palms, Riverside -->
<postcode code="92276" areacode="760" legislature="CA" timezone="-8" DST="Y" /> <!-- 1000 Palms, Riverside -->
</Postcodes>
This file is in standard XML format. Typically, the <Postcodes> tag surrounds a series of <postcode> tags.
A <postcode> tag has the following properties:
| Property | Meaning |
|---|---|
| code | The postcode of the area. |
| areacode | The telephone area code of the area. |
| legislature | The legislature code of the area, and corresponds to the code properties of the <legislature> tags in legislatures.xml. |
| timezone | The timezone offset for the area being defined. |
| DST | Whether or not daylight savings time is employed in the area (Y= yes, N = no) |