3 ms·
On the certificates, we'd state e.g. "this policy runs from 27th March 2019 at 16:52:12 (GMT) to 3rd April 2019 at 17:52:12 (BST)" for a 168-hour (~7 day) polic
by BillinghamJ 8y ago
On the certificates, we'd state e.g. "this policy runs from 27th March 2019 at 16:52:12 (GMT) to 3rd April 2019 at 17:52:12 (BST)" for a 168-hour (~7 day) policy.
Logically, we think of it as the "wall clock" time, plus the location ("Europe/London" - we don't operate outside the UK yet), plus the local zone (BST/GMT) to handle ambiguity when clocks go back.
Practically, right now the start/end date-times are stored using a Postgres timestamp with no timezone. As we've never issued an individual policy of more than 28 days' duration or more than 7 days in advance, we've never actually had to deal with any situation where the point-in-time is no longer correct. And this case is not likely to happen without a decent amount of notice.
We're very much in favour of abolishing seasonal transitions though - causes lots of confusion.
- jcranmer 8y ago> And this case is not likely to happen without a decent amount of notice. In the jurisdictions you care about. Last-minute timezone changes do happen, and the main time zone database has been updated retroactively in the past. It's actually possible that a timezone change has even been enacted retroactively (thanks to countries that like doing very last-minute DST starts).
- BillinghamJ 8y agoYeah indeed - for now we're fortunate that it's not something we need to worry about actually handling perfectly. It's more something we like to think about at this point. One day we will need to deal with it and conversations like these are super helpful to support that.