1. What date-time do we store in the database (mainly in post_info.asp)? Is it not strForumTimeAdjust? That value is meant to be in Universal Coordinated Time (UTC) (or GMT). (This must be wron, see the third item)


2. When getting the date/time back on screen, it is converted back...


3. Users use that to compensate the difference between server timezone and userbase timezone (usually a single country), so strForumTimeAdjust is not necessarily UTC.


4. If the strTimeAdjust is not set correctly (e.g. left default 0, or set to a wrong value) values in the database will not be UTC, but in server timezone or in an arbitrary timezone.


5. If we change the strTimeAdjust in the middle of forum life, there will be a jump in time depending on the change. So, after the change, one can have temporarily have posts "apperantly made in the future".


6. strTimeAdjust does not take the daylight savings automatically into account. But because the sever the forum resides take them into account (if set into correct locale, a must be), there can be a +60 or -60 minutes jump, unless the admin compensates for the change by changing strTimeAdjust.


7. This whole process tries to assure (if strTimeAdjust is kept correct always) server movements and daylightsaving changes do not effect the date-time values.

1. The idea behind this MOD is four-fold:
   * Firstly, it makes it more understandable with providing city names;
   * secondly it takes the Daylight savings automatically into account ;
   * third it also makes special timezone differences which have partial hour (30 minute) differences;
   * fourth it enables the users to set their own time zones, so that they don't need to calculate.
   


2. What it does not is: It does not show what time is in that members timezone. But this can easily be added as another MOD.

1. Is the UTC idea I explained above implemented? (I think it must be a must)


2. What is intServerBias for? The code tries to get the timezone offset from java, but if it cannot get it, it is assumed to be zero. It is only used in config.asp to calculate strForumTimeAdjust. It could be used as a verification mechanism (but it is not), it can be the mechanism which compensates for daylight changes, but I cannot be sure on this...


3. The logic behind this must be:
   * Convert the date-time into UTC correctly, also taking the daylightsavings on the server timezone into account,
   * Save that UTC date-time into the database
   * When the data is needed to be shown, it will be shown in users timezone
   
   Are the above correct?
   


4. What is the mechanism that triggers a date-time change in server/member timezones? For members, login/logout/cookie-delete will do it, but is there an automatic way? For server side, it seems the admin has to enter and repost date-time configuration, am I correct? Is there an automatic way?

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Originally posted by HuwR


3) Users are unable to control any aspect of the time displayed, it displays the forum time to everyone.

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1) The purpose of the mod was to display post times in the users own local timezone.

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2) the code uses SERVER side javascript to try to ascertain the servers offset from gmt, this caused an error on some servers with older java engines, so if it errors it defaults to zero. (some people do not know the timezone of the server, hence the attempt to do it automatically) it is needed to calculate the initial time offset for the forum.

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If not valid_server_timezone_data_entered then
   try to calculate intServerBias, if not possible set it to 0
else
   get the timezone data
   try to calculate intServerBias
   if possible_to_calculate then
      check the entered data with intServerBias and warn if no match
   else 
      intServerBias = 0
   end if
end

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4) it is manual for the forum since its offsets are stored in an app variable, it could be done automatically by saving the next change date in an app variable as well, then check that against todays date before it calculates strforumtimeadjust.

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If I'm not mistaking: If the database values were kept in UTC, a server move to another timezone, or daylight saving changes would not cause a "quantum leap" provided that the old/new timezones are kept correctly and daylight saving are calculated automatically.

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changing the way time is actually stored would create enormous problems when upgrading existing forums.

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intServerBias

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