Question about handling timezones

Rails
1

Hi,

My doubt is about how to make request to mysql using a different time
than utf with this I try to say something like this

User request for registers from 2012-02-13, his timezone is cst.

Mysql works with utc so if a register was created after 6 p.m cst time
it will be saved with the date like 2012-02-14 00:10:… so I’m
wondering what I can do to show the user all the registers created in
the date he asked depending in the timezone he is working.

2

On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 7:47 PM, art tav [email protected] wrote:

the date he asked depending in the timezone he is working.

You may consider using a real “Date” object to store a date …

require ‘date’
Date.today.to_s #=> “2012-02-15”

I made the mistake once to use Time (DateTime actually) to store a real
“date”
and it continued to create difficulties with different timezones etc.
(not
because
of the language, but because of the “real life” issue that a contract
starts at a
certain date and this is in reality a different time depending on the
Time Zone).

If you still can change it to a real date format in the database column,
consider it
seriously.

HTH,

Peter

–
*** Available for a new project ***

Peter V.
http://twitter.com/peter_v
http://rails.vandenabeele.com
http://coderwall.com/peter_v

3

You may consider using a real “Date” object to store a date …

require ‘date’
Date.today.to_s #=> “2012-02-15”

I made the mistake once to use Time (DateTime actually) to store a real
“date”
and it continued to create difficulties with different timezones etc.
(not
because
of the language, but because of the “real life” issue that a contract
starts at a
certain date and this is in reality a different time depending on the
Time Zone).

If you still can change it to a real date format in the database column,
consider it
seriously.

Well then you really suggest that I change the datetime format for a
date format to deal with this issue? The time is used for knowing
exactly when the transaction was made and we really need this
information… but for purposes of searching and retrieving the
information of the db may be I can create a new date field hmmm

4

On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 9:22 PM, art tav [email protected] wrote:

of the language, but because of the “real life” issue that a contract
exactly when the transaction was made and we really need this
information… but for purposes of searching and retrieving the
information of the db may be I can create a new date field hmmm

  • transaction time (needed for logging), will probably be a created_at
    for a new contract, new subscription, etc. (on a technical level)

  • contract_start_at would be more the “contractual/commercial/legal/
    user facing” aspect of saying “you have started paying for the service
    from 15 Feb 2012, so it is valid until 14 Feb 2013”. Of course the
    calculation of that Date still has to occur in the timezone of the
    user,
    so maybe my proposal does not really solve the root issue, or makes
    it even worse ? Hmmm, non-trivial …

Peter

–
*** Available for a new project ***

Peter V.
http://twitter.com/peter_v
http://rails.vandenabeele.com
http://coderwall.com/peter_v

5

Well I think something like that would be the most elegant and simple
solution because doing other things that I’ve been thinking about will
require a lot of complex work and that could be bad solution in the end.

Thanks for the idea