timezone abbreviation different in date() / DateTime::format() ??

[jonnott]

Hi,

I'm trying to get PHP to output the current timezone abbreviation, also taking into account DST.

With date(), this works fine using the 'T' format string, in combination with date_default_timezone_set(), as follows:

Timezone: 'Europe/London'; 'T': GMT or BST (DST)
Timezone: 'Europe/Prague'; 'T': CET or CEST (DST)
Timezone: 'UTC'; 'T': UTC (always)

But if I use the same 'T' format string with DateTime::format(), which I need to do in my problem scenario, it always outputs a GMT offset instead, like

Timezone: 'Europe/London'; 'T': GMT +01:00

However, the PHP manual suggests that the interpretation of format strings is meant to be identical for both date() and DateTime::format().

Anyone had similar problems, or know a work around for getting the proper abbreviation (e.g. BST, CEST) with DateTime::format()? Is it an OS-dependant thing?

I'm using PHP 5.2.6 with Apache/2.0.54 (Fedora)

Jon

[Shrike]

Here's the output from one of our servers, looks pretty standard.

paulh@LON1-WEBSERVER-01:~$ php -a
Interactive shell

php > $d = new DateTime;
php > echo $d->format( 'T' );
BST
php > $d = new DateTime( '2010-01-01' );
php > echo $d->format( 'T' );
GMT
php >

Are you sure your format string does not have the 'O' or 'P' flags for timezone difference?

[jonnott]

Ah, problem discovered! Seems to make a difference whether you give the DateTime constructor a *nix timestamp or a formatted date string:

[root@lenny ~]# php -a
Interactive shell

php > 
php > $d = new DateTime('@1270425600',new DateTimeZone('Europe/Prague'));
php > echo $d->format('T');
GMT+0000
php > $d = new DateTime(date('Y-m-d H:i:s',1270425600),new DateTimeZone('Europe/Prague'));
php > echo $d->format('T');
CEST
php >