Much help would be appreciated
All time fields in the Moodle database are stored in UNIX time format. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_time There ways to convert this to a more human readable format using formulas in excel etc. or on-line converters like: http://www.epochconverter.com/
Jon
Jon
Not quite but only because I wasn't clear enough. Moodle core stores a unix timestamp which is indifferent to timezone. It is only on display that timezones may come to effect and for that displaying time in moodle should be done through a lib function which looks for site admin timezone setting or user pref. In site admin setting the default is server local time and you can select any time zone and do or don't force it. You can also use the default and config your server local time to a desired timezone.
Thanks. I think I understand! Moodle always stores the offset from 1/1/1970 UTC, regardless of any timezones. Then the lib function handles the timezone conversions based on how the site admin has configured the Moodle site.
If I create a form that requires the user to capture a date will those user dates be saved to the database according to the timezone on my server, or as the offset from 1/1/1970 UTC? In other words, does the Moodle lib convert the dates that the user captures into the timezone indifferent offset?
Moodle's treatment of user input with respect to date/time values may differ from module to module depending on purpose. In the database module, user input in the date field is converted to server/user timezone according to the admin settings before storing in the database. Suppose than that a user adds a new entry with a date field and enters the current date. Since the user input is converted according to timezone but the internal timemodified is not, this may create a 1 day difference between the entry modified date and the user's date input, under certain timezone settings, unless you force server time. Hope that clarifies more than confuses.