Time glitch using APP

[+Saxo82A]

When I log a cache, using the app, I've noticed that it's logged 8 hours back in time. I suspect that this because of the app running on Seattle time (GMT-8) and not in local time, Danish (GMT+1). This is a problem, when hunting for night cache's, for specific dates, to qualify for challenges.

Can this be fixed?

[+rocketgarden]

Unfortunately, this is actually a side effect of the server's timekeeping, which is in fact in Seattle time. If I'm not mistaken*, the app reports logs with the appropriate timestamps (including GMT/UTC offsets), which the server then converts to PST time. So if you log a cache at 7am, January 3rd (local time), the app sends date "2016-01-03" and time "0700+0100" (7am in UTC+1) to the server. The server then converts this to PST (UTC-8), which results in 10pm January 2nd, PST.

 

It's not so much that the time stamps are incorrect, but the lines between yesterday/today/tomorrow are relative to Seattle time. We're aware it can cause issues for geocachers in international time zones, but it's not something we can fix without re-architecting the way the whole system keeps track of log timestamps, and potentially rendering all past log times inaccurate. Either that or we invent time machine trackables.

 

However, there is a way to fix your temporally misplaced logs, which is detailed in this KB article: https://support.Grou...=kb.page&id=545

 

*I may be mistaken. Thinking about timezones too much makes my head hurt, as the video in the KB article illustrates.

Edited January 7, 2016 by rocketgarden

[+on4bam]

It's not so much that the time stamps are incorrect, but the lines between yesterday/today/tomorrow are relative to Seattle time. We're aware it can cause issues for geocachers in international time zones, but it's not something we can fix without re-architecting the way the whole system keeps track of log timestamps, and potentially rendering all past log times inaccurate. Either that or we invent time machine trackables.

 

However, there is a way to fix your temporally misplaced logs, which is detailed in this KB article: https://support.Grou...=kb.page&id=545

 

I guess it should be possible to fix as when I load my founds in GSAK (from GPS geocache_visits.txt with UTC timestamp) and log via API caches are logged on the correct date. I've never had a cache logged "yesterday" using that method being 9 hours ahead of Seattle.

[+thornsoft]

Unfortunately, this is actually a side effect of the server's timekeeping, which is in fact in Seattle time.

 

This shouldn't be that difficult. Each device knows its timezone, and how to convert to/from UTC. Log everything as UTC in the database, convert to/from when updating/viewing.... I know, I know, sounds easy...