RE: [PHP-DEV] rfc2616 datetime format?

> -----Original Message----- > From: Derick Rethans [mailto:derick@php.net] > Sent: 04 October 2010 09:55 > To: Stas Malyshev > Cc: PHP Internals > Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] rfc2616 datetime format? > > On Sun, 3 Oct 2010, Stas Malyshev wrote: > > > > The reason is that in order to format a DateTime object > as GMT, it > > > needs to be converted to GMT... and you can't simply do that with > > > just a constant consisting of a string of format characters. > > > > I see what you mean and it makes sense, having constant may > imply that > > you can use it with any date and get proper result... But > RFC2616 is > > the one of the most used formats on the Web - actually, the format > > that is called COOKIE is not the one that should be used in > cookies - > > RFC2616 should be used instead. COOKIE one uses T, which may or may > > not be GMT, depending on the date and local system > settings. Maybe we > > should have proper RFC format too, accompanied with appropriate > > warning that you should use it with GMT dates (or gmdate())? > > Well, gmdate() is only part of it; the same constants are > also used for the DateTime object (which is preferred over > timestamps anyway). The problem lays exactly there because we > can't just convert the timezone of an object just for formatting. > > I wanted to prevent adding just a format letter for the whole > format as well (which would partially solve it), but we're > almost out of letters. > Adding a format letter that forces GMT means we would need to > loop over the whole format string twice, making things highly > more complicated. > > It is a tricky one, and let's think about whether we can come > up with something useful here. > > cheers, > Derick > Surely makes better sense to create a function/method for it specifically, rather than adding new formatting letters? Python has something like time.httpdate() Jared