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Time Stamp Difference – New Topic 🙂

EK Edward Koon
Edward Koon
Member
Member since Mar 2012
577 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 8:39 am · Edited
FidoSysop: This would have been much easier as a new thread!

OK – I am still not getting a good picture here whatsoever. So let’s please go back to basics and take this slowly one point at a time. It would be easier for me if we were talking city settings instead of UTC but if that is your preference then OK.

Let’s start with three questions. Firstly about THIS site.

  1. On THIS site – Simple-Press – what timezone do you have set in your SP profile – display options?
  2. When you read THIS post – the date and time will be shown on the left above my avatar. Note that and then go back to the topic list to check if the time reported there matches. Does it?

Now to your site.

  1. So you have your WP server set to timestamp posts in UTC-4 – which I assume is correct for Florida. I know I have asked this already but the answer was ambiguous. When you make a new post on YOUR site – is the date/time correctly set in the database for that post. Again this is best determined by looking at the date/time shown on the left of the post above the avatar – or – directly in the database.

Let’s get these points definitively cleared up first…

 

OK, On this site my profile time is set to UTC-4. Your last message to me is at 5:17 AM. The topic list does not show a time of last message, just 3 hours ago. Seems off by 1 hour.

I just did a test post on my site and the time stamp is correct at 9:28 AM

I think this is where the confusion is: I had changed my profile time zone to UTC+0 to get the correct time on the newly entered messages.

Now i just went in and changed my profile TZ to UTC-4 like it should be, did a reply to the 1st test message and the time stamp reports 5:34 AM. Also the previously entered message was showing 4 hours earlier.

If my WP and SP time zones are correct for my locale, shouldn’t the times be correct for my tz also?

8 Answers

New Answer
YS Yellow Swordfish
Yellow Swordfish
Member
Member since Nov 2008
16,437 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 9:39 am

let’s deal with the answers to this site first and take the post you made above.

Our server timezone is Chicago. My own local timezone is London (UK).

Your post is stamped 08:39:51 (Chicago time).

London is currently 6 hours in front of Chicago so in my timezone you posted it at 2:39pm

When I view your post it does, indeed, state that it was posted at 2:39pm

Florida, I believe, is currently 1 hour in front of Chicago so in your timezone you posted it at 09:39am – which I assume is correct.

So when you look at the post above you should see a posted date of 9:39am.

don’t forget that the times I have outlined above take into account current Daylight Saving settings. UTC values do not.

So – on this site are these the values you see – taking into account any variation that may be needed for DST?

EK Edward Koon
Edward Koon
Member
Member since Mar 2012
577 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 9:52 am

Your post to me reads 10:39 AM.

I do believe Chicago and Dallas are in the same time zone.

MY WordPress blog posts reflect the correct time for me which is USA Eastern Daylight Savings Time. 

A post in my forums is -4 Hours behind at UTC-4 – USA Eastern Daylight Savings Time.

To get my forum posts to match my actual time when logged in i must set SP Profile time to UTC+0

Simple Press profile time at UTC-4 is 4 hours behind what it should be.

Can’t make it any simpler than that. cool

EK Edward Koon
Edward Koon
Member
Member since Mar 2012
577 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 10:57 am

I also notice that while my posts are the correct time in the post and database, the topic list says last post 4 hours ago. I had did a reply post 5 minutes before.

Here are a couple of screen shots.

These are with my profile time set to UTC+0

http://www.docsplace.org/misc/timestamp.jpg

http://www.docsplace.org/misc/timestamp1.jpg

So my post is showing the correct time i posted it, but the board thinks it was 4 hours ago.

YS Yellow Swordfish
Yellow Swordfish
Member
Member since Nov 2008
16,437 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 11:13 am

Ok now I am confused even more. What has Dallas got to with anything please? Your location is set at Clearwater, Florida?

Plus – neither Florida OR Texas are in the UTC-4 region. Texas is mainly UTC-6 (Dallas is UTC-6) with some western areas actually in UTC-7. Illinois is also UTC-6. So where does UTC-4 come in to the picture?

Any why not just use the city setting to make life easier? And UTC doesn’t reflect DST.

EK Edward Koon
Edward Koon
Member
Member since Mar 2012
577 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 11:35 am

I set both the WP and SP time zones to New York. There is no Clearwater, Tampa, Etc in Florida available to choose from.

NOW the post and last topic times are correct. I still don’t see why the NY and UTC-4 would be different.

http://www.timetemperature.com/tzus/time_zone_codes_us.shtml

Eastern Daylight Time is UTC-4 and Eastern Standard Time is UTC-5. Were in EDT now.

The point i was trying to make is, what difference would NY be from either EST or EDT since Florida and Yankee Land are in the same Time Zone. Why does SP not reflect the current time unless a City is chosen over a UTC format?

Anyway.. It seems to be correct set for NY. Just this could be extremely confusing for some other poor sap that hasn’t fingered it out on his own.. confused

But anyhooooo.. Thanks for your time.

YS Yellow Swordfish
Yellow Swordfish
Member
Member since Nov 2008
16,437 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 11:53 am

Well I think this is the gist of the problem. New York is in UTC-5. UTC does NOT actually change to reflect DST no matter what that link says. UTC is specifically designed to avoid localised time changes and have a coherant global specification. To reflect DST you need to use a country/city based timezone.

Still confused about Dallas though 🙂

EK Edward Koon
Edward Koon
Member
Member since Mar 2012
577 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 12:11 pm

YellowSwordfish, If anything there would be 1 Hour difference between EST and EDT any way you shake em.

I have never used a City or Country time settings on any other boards i have operated. Most recent was phpBB3. I either used UTC-4 or UTC-5 depending on whether it was daylight savings time or not.

Even this site is showing 4 Hours difference between UTC-4 and New York time. That’s not correct.

Not trying to confuse you, but the difference is right here in these screen shots.

http://www.docsplace.org/misc/timestamp2.jpg

http://www.docsplace.org/misc/timestamp3.jpg

YS Yellow Swordfish
Yellow Swordfish
Member
Member since Nov 2008
16,437 posts
Mar 30, 2012 · 12:38 pm

No that doesn’t look right, At most I there should be a two hour difference. And that is lifted WP code!

There is one other factor that we seen at play with some users and there is a fix coming for this in 5.0.5 and was, in fact, being discussed on the original thread this series of posts was on. We have encountered some plugins that reset the WP server set timezone (for reasons I am not aware of) and do not reset it back after they have done whatever it is they do.

This effect, if present, can be seen in SP from any AJAX code or SP code not on a forum page. So – the popup new posts listing and the new posts widget for example, can show the wrong time due to this reset having taken place.

The profile panel you have linked to above is displayed using an Ajax call so would be subject to this behaviour. So might it be possible you have a plugin that may be resetting the WP timezone for any reason? Obvious candidates would be anything that manipulates dates in any way. One such is something called the all in one events calendar for example.