Posted by Marcus on 12/17/90 11:54

Marcus wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I need a timezone to store timestamps in that is independent of daylight
> saving. From everything I've read, it seems I want either GMT or UTC.
> The only problem is I can't figure out from any documentation I've read
> if there is any difference (practically speaking, not scientifically and
> taking into account the earth's orbit etc).
>
> I can set my server timezone to GMT, but if I want UTC I will have to
> use putenv('TZ=UTC'). Could someone please confirm if they are in fact
> the same or if one is better, and if I am correct in stating that
> neither is affected by daylight saving? Lastly, if I set my server to
> GMT (or UTC for that matter), am I also correct in saying that in that
> case gmmktime() and gmdate() are the exact same as mktime() and date()?
> Thank you very much in advance for your help.

I should elaborate on my first point and ask additionally if a call to:

mktime(12, 0, 0, 5, 10, 2007);

for example, will always return the exact same timestamp in either GMT
or UTC timezone and vice versa, i.e. 1 timestamp resulting in the exact
same 12:00:00 readout via date() whether GMT or UTC. Thanks.

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