Just dates in calendar, timezone problems

[Nuutti_Kotivuori1]

I’d like to have a “Date” fields in my table, where the user selects a date with the date picker, and then have the calendar show that exact date. This obviously works when browser timezone is PST, but if it is anything else, the calendar will show times such as “10:00 AM” with the dates - and obviously sometimes will show the event on the wrong day, if the browser timezone moves it to the previous day.

Now, my users are all in the same timezone, and I actually mean that my dates are in a specific timezone. I can create a new field with a formula that allows me to do something like Concatenate(Date, " 00:00 EST") which gives me correct dates in a different timezone. However, I am not in “EST”, but in “EET” (Finland) - and Coda does not understand the “EET” timezone. I can put in “+02:00” instead of the timezone, but that unfortunately does not take daylight savings in to account when we use “+03:00”, so the dates are mostly off.

The best I have come up with is simply saying Date-Hours(10), which correctly offset the time for my timezone, both winter time and summer time - but unfortunately EU transfers to summer time at a different time than PST, so there are a few dates in the middle where the shift is wrong.

So I have no idea how to create a formula that would shift the dates properly, or anything that would solve my issue.

Honestly, I want timezone agnostic dates. The event happens on a certain date, at a local location, and it will just be terribly confusing if it shows on a different day for a foreign visitor. If they would arrive for the event, they obviously will use local dates here to plan.

So, the one fix that would solve everything for me - make Calendar view always show everything in PST, regardless of browser time zone - if support for timezone agnostic dates are not to be added.

[Jack_Casey]

I am having the same issue while trying to make a simple availability calendar. I just want dates with no time information, but I’m getting 4pm etc on my events, and then when adding an event on the calendar directly it doesn’t show any time (I’m guessing it’s midnight or something), but also won’t “match” a time with the 4pm, so filtering by a date picker doesn’t work nicely.

I tried sprinkling “DateTimeTrunk(‘day’)” around the place but it didn’t seem to help at all.

Seems like dates (without times) are actually implemented as dates with times under the hood and it’s playing up with timezones. FYI I’m a developer and we have very similar annoying issues with our product, it’s a pain to solve. Perhaps being able to set the timezone of the document would help? Overriding any user specific timezones?

Or a timezone agnostic date only data type that behaves itself on calendars would also be perfect for my use case.

[Jean_Pierre_Traets]

Hi,

You are 100% right that the time zone issue needs to be solved.
In the below post you will find a work around from user @benblee

Hi, How do I set time based formula?

Time Zones add a little bit to the equation, but it’s not too bad. I prefer to create a Timezones table so the solution is more flexible. I use a three part system that helps simplify anything I need to do afterwards with time. Timezones table that contains the adjustments for each timezone I’ll need to use. MyTimezone canvas variable that is a dropdown of all the timezone options from the Timezones table. CurrentTime canvas variable that reads in the current time and adjusts it to the chos…

Kind regards,
//JP

[Nuutti_Kotivuori1]

The workaround unfortunately does not work - it does not handle daylight savings time transitions.

[Jean_Pierre_Traets]

Hi,

I agree that the timezone issue is one of the bigger shortcomings at this stage at Coda and I am sure they will fix it and hopeful soon.

A “builders” never give up, have a look in this solution credits to @Joe_Innes

As he has created a table specifying when certain tax rates are applicable, in the same way a table for the daylight savings time transitions could be set up get the updates accordingly.

@Mallikar like we have currently already some templates when opening a new section, the above would be helpful to get it standard rolled out. The same for tables containing week numbers and many more standard time and date related content that are on the foundation of many use-cases.

Kind regards,
//JP

[Dalmo_Mendonca]

Broken Timezones is the single reason holding me back in recommending Coda to anyone here in New Zealand.

Workarounds do work locally in a formula or reference, but require a lot of effort.

But the calendar view is inherently broken:

[Rob_Claisse]

Surely Coda.io have to have some plan about how they are gonna solve the inconsistencies in the dates across tables, calendar etc. I’m not even sure how the following is working out, the date/time I specify in my table of data shows up differently in different parts of the calendar view (12:00am is the correct value):

At the moment there are so many inconsistencies as a document can’t quite decide if it should respect PST, the local time zone or simply the date/time that is entered in a field. Personally I think it would far less confusing if timezones were ignored and the date/times entered were simply what you enter in a field. Then have advanced options to allow date/times to change according to the local timezone if the user requires it. For everyone not living on the west coast of the USA this is a right PITA.

And everyone outside the US would also love to be able to dates in the correct format - dd/mm/yyyy

[Justin_Cox]

did you ever figure out a solve for this?

[Jean_Pierre_Traets]

Dear @Justin_Cox ,

You are able to configure the time zone setting in your doc.