Rails time formatting test failing because it's one hour off? - ruby-on-rails

Question

I have the following method in one of my Rails classes:
def human_departure_time
"#{departure_time.strftime("%A, %d %B %Y")} at #{departure_time.strftime("%I:%M %p")}"
end
As you can see, it just takes a datetime attribute of the model and formats it so that it is more human friendly.
Anyway, I have the following test for this method:
describe "human_departure_time" do
it "should output the time in readable format" do
# first I use the Timecop gem to freeze the time
Timecop.freeze(DateTime.now) do
bus_time = DateTime.now + 1.days
# factory a bus with a specific departure time
bus = Factory :bus, departure_time: bus_time
expected = "#{bus_time.strftime("%A, %d %B %Y")} at #{bus_time.strftime("%I:%M %p")}"
# check that the output is as expected
bus.human_departure_time.should == expected
end
end
end
Pretty simple but the test fails by one hour with the following output:
Failures:
1) Bus human_departure_time should output the time in readable format
Failure/Error: bus.human_departure_time.should == expected
expected: "Wednesday, 17 August 2011 at 03:13 AM"
got: "Wednesday, 17 August 2011 at 02:13 AM" (using ==)
# ./spec/models/bus_spec.rb:34:in `block (4 levels) in <top (required)>'
# ./spec/models/bus_spec.rb:30:in `block (3 levels) in <top (required)>'
Here is my bus factory just incase that is important. I'm overwriting the departure time with the frozen time plus one hour in my test.
factory :bus do
origin_name "Drogheda"
event_name "EP"
departure_time { DateTime.now + 14.days }
end
I assume this is something to do with daylight savings time or something? How can I fix this issue?

Answer 1

ActiveRecord could be automatically converting time attributes in your model to local time.
You can try and use the %Z parameter of strftime to see the time zone of the outputted timestamp to see where a possible conversion is sneaking into your time.
Some Googled hints that might be relevant:
default_timezone:
http://apidock.com/rails/ActiveRecord/Base/default_timezone/class
ActiveRecord::Base.time_zone_aware_attributes
config.active_record.time_zone_aware_attributes:
http://tamersalama.com/2011/01/10/rails-disable-timezone-conversions/
https://mirrors.kilnhg.com/Repo/Mirrors/From-Git/Rails/History/70cb470c1ab8
http://www.ruby-forum.com/topic/2096919
http://www.ruby-forum.com/topic/890711