Yesterday was the day here in the United States when we do the semiannual changing of the clocks.

My computer has been able to change its own time since at least as far back as when I started college in 1990. In the twenty years since then, intelligent time support in other consumer electronics has increased leaps and bounds. I’m sure of it. After all, since then the internet has sped communications world wide, processing power has increased over 100 fold, and the open source movement has given us a vast library of free software. How hard can it be?

Let me make it clear I don’t think I have very high standards in this regard. It is not like wondering where my jet pack is, or my flying car. What I’m looking for is the ability for a device to understand daylight savings time and adjust itself twice a year. I’m not even looking for the device to synchronize its clock with an external source, which should also be a no-brainer in this day and age.

So, let’s run the list.

The computers can, of course.

The wireless access points and routers can.

My phone can. The TiVo can. Good thing, too. The time at which something happens is pretty important to those two devices.

My car can, but gets the date off by a week in the fall and three weeks in the spring. Yes, I need to get an updated sat nav DVD with a patch for the 2005 changes.

That’s it. Everything else needs to be manually adjusted.

The mechanical wall clock cannot. The twenty year-old alarm clock cannot. The kitchen appliances -- stove, coffee maker, rice cooker and microwave -- cannot. OK, no real surprises there.

The programmable thermostat cannot.

The Wii & PS3 cannot. At first I wasn’t sure if the Wii did because its clock was off by about a half hour.

The TV cannot. Sad, really, since it runs MontaVista Linux for the on screen menus.

The Wi-Fi enabled OfficeJet printer cannot.

The laser printer is excused. It doesn’t appear to keep time.

My, how far we’ve come.