TimeZones - help wanted ... help needed ... desperate for help

[Oliver]

Hello,

I am writing an application that will be used across multiple time zones
(Eastern to Pacific) and since much of the application revolves around time
stamps, I need a best practice for storing time information in a database
and displaying it correctly to the user (adjusted for his respective time
zone). I have been thinking about using UTC and adjusting everything when I
output it, but then the user cannot use the native data in the database
(e.g. for reporting services).

Is there any elegant way to do this (my dream would be a session-specific
time zone setting that will adjust all date to string and string to date
functions). Anybody had a similar problem?

I CANNOT SAY HOW MUCH YOUR HELP WILL BE APPRECIATED

Oliver

[Jim Hubbard]

Does it need to be adjusted for the user? Would it work to simply display
EST or CST along with the date/time?

I like your idea about using UTC the best, because any way you cut it, the
user will have to make adjustments for the time unless you have a field for
each time zone and store the info for each time zone. But, this seems like
a huge waste to me.

You mentioned having the user access native data for reporting. How are
these reports generated?

What type of database are you using (SQL?)?

Do the users actually "see" the data in the database?

"Oliver" <sp**@deviso.com> wrote in message
news:1104398554.4cff3923c180ed9cb74037ebe6a8c43e@t eranews...

Hello,

I am writing an application that will be used across multiple time zones
(Eastern to Pacific) and since much of the application revolves around
time
stamps, I need a best practice for storing time information in a database
and displaying it correctly to the user (adjusted for his respective time
zone). I have been thinking about using UTC and adjusting everything when
I
output it, but then the user cannot use the native data in the database
(e.g. for reporting services).

Is there any elegant way to do this (my dream would be a session-specific
time zone setting that will adjust all date to string and string to date
functions). Anybody had a similar problem?

I CANNOT SAY HOW MUCH YOUR HELP WILL BE APPRECIATED

Oliver