Rails - Getting datetime_select into user timezone for model validation - ruby-on-rails

I tried to get this answered with no luck so I'll try again.
I've implemented the railcast timezone goodies to allow the user to set their time zone. It works. Time.zone.now gives the correct time zone. It's in here
http://stevenyue.com/2013/03/23/date-time-datetime-in-ruby-and-rails/
I have events and have been trying to get the datetime_select in my form to give me a time that is also in the user's time zone.
My goal is to be able to compare it to current time (Time.zone.now) to validate that the start time is not before current time. And eventually end time > start time etc.
I've tired several ways including this one with no luck...
This one - he answered his own question later (is exactly my problem)
Rails datetime_select posting my current time in UTC
def start_date_cannot_be_in_the_past
if date_start.in_time_zone(Time.zone) < Time.zone.now
errors.add(:date_start, "has already passed")
end
end
The above doesn't seem to work because you can't extract date_start just like that. It's separated into different components, so I tried to do something like this
def start_date_cannot_be_in_the_past
date = DateTime.new(params[event][date_start(1i)].to_i, params[event][date_start(2i)].to_i, params[event][date_start(3i)].to_i, params[event][date_start(4i)].to_i, params[event][date_start(5i)].to_i)
if date.in_time_zone < Time.zone.now
errors.add(:date_start, "has already passed")
end
end
In my model I can't access params so I don't know how to get this to work...
I want to move to a jquery calendar/time picker if possible as I can't seem to get this work.. but any suggestions on alternatives or on this is appreciated..

Make sure you have this line in your model:
validate :start_date_cannot_be_in_the_past
and then this method can be something like:
private
def start_date_cannot_be_in_the_past
errors.add(:date_start, "has already passed") if self.date_start < Time.zone.now
end
See this for more information.

Related

Rails - How to save datetimes correctly in MongoID and trigger them with whenerver (cronjobs)?

I try to save datetimes into events in MongoDB with Mongoid. The difficulty is that I want to save them for different timezones (e.g. Berlin and London). I want the user (admin) to see the actual time in the timezone so that he does not need to calculate. Afterwards I have a cron job in whenever, which looks every minute for an event to process.
I have the following parameters:
application.rb (I tried without -> standard UTC -> London is ok, Berlin wrong hour)
config.time_zone = 'Berlin' # as the server stays in Germany
mongoid.yml (tried all combinations, need use_activesupport_time_zone to get correct times int oDB though)
use_activesupport_time_zone: true
use_utc: false
schedule.rb (no problem here so far)
every 1.minutes do
runner "Event.activate_due", environment: 'development'
end
event.rb (not sure for which times I am looking now)
def self.activate_due
events_due = Event.where(:eventStart.lte => (Time.now + 1.minute), :eventStart.gte => (Time.now))
events_due.each do |e|
e.activate
end
end
I tried to change the Time.zone in events#new in order to depict the timezone's actual time in the simple_form. It seems to work, but then the controller create method seems to treat the params as standard time zone again and transforms it wrongly (+-1hour when experimenting with London/Berlin). I tried out almost every parameter combination and also Time.now/Time.zone.now.
In event#index I switch through time_zones in order to show the right time.
To complicate things a bit: I save the timezone in the area model, which is connected through areaId with the event model.
How would I show the admin in the form the correct time for the event in the zone he wants to add (not his timezone) and save it correctly in Mongo to trigger it through the cronjob later?
Try the following
def self.activate_due
events_due = Event.where(
:eventStart.to_utc.lte =>(Time.now.to_utc),
:eventStart.to_utc.gte => (1.minute.ago.to_utc))
events_due.each do |e|
e.activate
end
end
Plesse note that this will work with UTC times, so if you have an event in UTC - 7 timezone don't think it will get activated now if the server timezone is UTC + 2

Rails Date and Time user entered isn't in UTC

I've looked through a lot of issues like this but none seem to correspond to my issue, which is:
I have a Rails app that contains events. Event is a model that has attributes for start date (Date field), start time (Time) and end time (Time). When I created them, I didn't convert any of the entered dates to UTC based times (all times local).
I'm trying to find out if the event is over. I've added a few methods to my model that should help with this, but because I'm comparing Apples (non-UTC) to Oranges (UTC) time. I'm running into a brick wall.
Because I'm mixing Date and Times, I've added the following methods to my Event model:
helpers
def date_start_time
return DateTime.new(self.date.year, self.date.month, self.date.day, self.start_time.hour, self.start_time.min, self.start_time.sec)
end
def date_end_time
return DateTime.new(self.date.year, self.date.month, self.date.day, self.end_time.hour, self.end_time.min, self.end_time.sec)
end
in_past method
def in_past
logger.debug 'comparing end time: ' + self.date_end_time.to_s + ' to the current time: ' + DateTime.now.to_s
self.date_end_time <= DateTime.now
end
I'm loading an event in Rails Console that should end in a few minutes, but I'm getting a true to in_past:
1.9.3-p194 :020 > event.in_past
comparing end time: 2013-08-19T20:38:00+00:00 to the current time: 2013-08-19T20:37:22-05:00
=> true
I've tried adding .zone to my DateTime.now, but that makes it worse it seems. I feel like I've tried every combination of Zone options here and really I'd just prefer to ignore time zones since all events are currently local.
Thoughts? Suggestions?
The quick solution to this is add timezone to rails config (application.rb) like this
config.time_zone = '<your local timezone>'
You can get all the available timezones by
#rake time:zones:all

Get hour from user and store in rails model + timezone

I have a rails view where the user is presented with a dropdown displaying the hours '00:00', '01:00' etc.
Once the user has selected this hour, then it is stored in the model with some other fields.
My application is working in timezone UTC+2 (I have set config.time_zone = 'Jerusalem').
At what stage to I related to timezones when handling this time on its path from the view to the model? If I use e.g. DateTime.strptime("10:00", "%H:%M").in_time_zone(Time.zone), then I get a time at '12:00' - while what I really would like is for the database to store in UTF (which should be 08:00 while the rest of the site works with local time.
You can use TZInfo ruby library http://tzinfo.rubyforge.org and convert your time with following method
def local_to_utc(date, time_zone)
begin
unless time_zone.nil?
tz = TZInfo::Timezone.get(time_zone)
return tz.local_to_utc(date)
end
rescue
return nil
end
end

How do I keep the time, but change the time zone?

I've looked at a few StackOverflow questions but none of them seem to crack the case.
My time for example is :
2012-04-19 08:42:00 +0200
This is what is inputed through the form. But everything is displayed relative to what timezone it is in. So because the computer works in UTC, this time after it is saved comes out as :
Wed, 18 Apr 2012 23:42:00 PDT -07:00
How do I keep the same time, but just change the zone?
I think the method Time.use_zone might help you. In the app I'm working one we wanted times to be interpreted according to the current user's time zone. Our User class was given a time_zone attribute, which is just a valid ActiveSupport::TimeZone string, and we created an around_filter as follows:
class ApplicationController < ActionController::Base
around_filter :activate_user_time_zone
def activate_user_time_zone
return yield unless current_user # nothing to do if no user logged in
return yield unless current_user.time_zone && ActiveSupport::TimeZone[current_user.time_zone] # nothing to do if no user zone or zone is incorrect
Time.use_zone(ActiveSupport::TimeZone[current_user.time_zone]) do
yield
end
end
end
Basically, this will execute the code in the controller action as if it was in the current user's time zone.
I have same requirement. Please check this and this link also
Alternatively
"2012-04-19 08:42:00 +0200".to_time.strftime("%c").to_datetime

Evaluate whether date is not one of past dates in model -- Ruby on Rails

I have a Day model which has a date column. I have to implement the validation that the date column must not have a past date. If the date is a past date it must not get saved to the database and give the appropriate error message right on the. I know I can put this validation in the controller, but I think it violates the MVC rules i.e keeping the business logic away from the controllers.
Is there any way to put this validation in the model or anywhere else and if the date is a past date then it must redirect back to the new action with the message "Date cannot be a past date"
Please Help
Thanks in advance
In your model you need add a validation
validate :not_past_date
def not_past_date
if self.date < Date.today
errors.add(:date, 'not in past')
end
end
After in your controller, you just check if save return true or false. False is send when you don't validate your model. If false redirect to another controller.
Edit :
Like said by Simone Carletti in comment you can use #past?
validate :not_past_date
def not_past_date
if self.date.past?
errors.add(:date, 'not in past')
end
end
I know I can put this validation in
the controller, but I think it
violates the MVC rules i.e keeping the
business logic away from the
controllers.
Eeh, in Rails you should put validations in the model (not in the controller!). See:
http://guides.rubyonrails.org/active_record_validations_callbacks.html.
#Simone and #shingara using the #past? method will compare a date with the current DateTime in UTC. So you may face a problem in two occasions here:
If you want to get all elements with a DateTime set to a day, wether they began at the beginning of the day or not;
If you are working on another TimeZone.
There are workarounds to deal with it, but it's just more straightforward to do the first #shingara way: self.date < Date.today

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