C# and Current Local time for different countries

Question

C# offers a way to get the current date by DateTime.Now. But the problem is my server is on US and I get the US time when I use DateTime.Now

Is there any way to get the current local time for a specific country in C# as my users are from around the world? (I have locale of each user, so if I Can get the current time for each locale then I’m safe)

I've seen a way using Time Zone but then I have to keep time zone vs country reference.

I’ve searched and most of the question here is about converting UTC time to local time and vice versa. Hope someone would be able to enlighten me.

Carniola

I dont offer a solution, but read the blog Whats wrong with datetime anyway for the problems related to DateTime/DateTimeOffet. . – Triecious

Get timezone by Country and Region – Log

Note that some countries span over several timezones. So knowing only the country may not be enough. Better knowing directly the user timezone from his computer. – Capitulum

Answer 1

Save your time in your server using UTC time (DateTime.UtcNow) and then depending on the users time zone you will change this utc time. Never save local time in the db

Languid

Have you read Whats wrong with datetime anyway. DateTime + local timezone + Day Light saving is not as simple to solve as it appears – Triecious

see this post #8614823 – Languid

Is it the same as DateTime.Now.ToUniversalTime()? – Arun

But how can I get the user time zone? – Lusterware

Answer 2

Just look at the TimeZoneInfo class. You should be able to convert to and from local to server time through there while maintaining DST (Daylight Savings time).

DateTimeOffset newTime = TimeZoneInfo.ConvertTime(DateTimeOffset.UtcNow, TimeZoneInfo.FindSystemTimeZoneById("AppTimeZone"));

You can also find an Open Source Time Zone Implementation by one of the Great Jon Skeet Noda Time

Zoltai