PHP gmmktime() not giving the right time

That function produces a Unix timestamp based on GMT time of the server in the United States, not the local time set there. This timestamp is good for database storage if that's what you're really trying to do. After retreival from the database, simply convert the GMT timestamp to local by adding or subtracting the number of hours offset from GMT based on their local time zone. Be sure to account for DST as well, the extra hour matters in certain parts of the year. The user will then see their local time and zone.

From the PHP docs:

So it is important the local time be correct, of course since the GMT calculations are based on local time. I doubt that's the issue - alot of users would be complaining, big time.

-jim

 

I found this on the PHP manual on php.net:

gmmktime() should ONLY be used to create a timestamp when specifying a specific GMT date and time.

If you want to make a valid time stamp for the current date & time, use mktime() instead.

UNIX timestamps, by definition, store the GMT time relative to the UNIX epoch.

gmmktime() (without any parameters specified) will effectively use the computer's LOCAL time values just the same as if they were explicit parameters, and the resulting time stamp will be incorrect. (The resulting timestamp will actually be offset in the OPPOSITE direction of the local timezone offset from GMT!)

And this will probably also help:

Beware that despite the documentation which states is_dst is ignored, with PHP 5.2 at least, it is not actually ignored and will cause a 1 hour offset on the UTC time returned.

This caused some interesting bugs, especially with the tzdelta function shown from previous posts below - you need to make the final parameter a 0 instead of $ar[8] otherwise you get an off-by-1-hour as a result.

As a result, I now use :

<?php
function tzdelta ( $iTime = 0 ) {
if ( 0 == $iTime ) { $iTime = time(); }
$ar = localtime ( $iTime );
$ar[5] += 1900; $ar[4]++;
$iTztime = gmmktime ( $ar[2], $ar[1], $ar[0], $ar[4], $ar[3], $ar[5], 0);
return ( $iTztime - $iTime );
}
?>

Hope it helps anyways.... Fabian