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  1. Python Driver
  2. PYTHON-222

PyMongo timezone transparency enhancement request

    • Type: Icon: New Feature New Feature
    • Resolution: Done
    • Priority: Icon: Major - P3 Major - P3
    • 3.1
    • Affects Version/s: None
    • Component/s: None
    • None

      This is a followup to my mongodb-user post:
      http://groups.google.com/group/mongodb-user/browse_thread/thread/18e3234c938de1c8
      Please consider this patch for inclusion in the MongoDB Python driver.

      Summary
      -------
      A patch that implements a bson.tzinfo module attribute that allows the
      user to work with naive local datetimes which the driver automatically
      converts to and from the recommended UTC storage format.

      Use cases
      ---------
      Web applications run on the server but are viewed and controlled from
      the client browser:

      • Clients and servers are are often in different timezones.
      • Clients expect to view and input localized datetimes.
      • Frameworks such as Django work best with naive local datetimes.
      • Typically the client's timezone is available to the server in login
        profiles or possibly calculated using client-side JavaScript.

      Non-Web apps are also simplified by not having to perform manual local
      to UTC conversions.

      How it works
      ------------
      If the bson.tzinfo module attribute is set to a pytz timezone then:

      • All naive datetimes feed to PyMongo are assumed to be in the
        bson.tzinfo timezone and are automatically converted UTC before
        being written to the database.
      • All aware datetimes feed to PyMongo are automatically converted UTC
        before being written to the database.
      • All (UTC) datetimes read from a database with PyMongo are
        automatically converted to aware datetimes in the bson.tzinfo
        timezone.

      To set the timezone do something like this:

      bson.tzinfo = pytz.timezone('Pacific/Auckland')

      To revert to default PyMongo behavior:

      bson.tzinfo = None

      Most Linux distribution store the local Olson timezone name in
      /etc/timezone – you can get a local tzinfo instance with something
      like:

      pytz.timezone(open('/etc/timezone').read().strip())

      Implementation
      --------------

      • The attached patch is against PyMongo 1.9 (at Git commit b6b0e7d).
        Apply with:

      patch -p1 <pymongo-timezone-transparency.patch

      • The patch includes both Python and CPython implementations.
      • The implementation is not dependent on pytz (but the user will need
        pytz to use the feature).
      • I've also attached a simple standalone sanity checker test
        (timezone-transparency-test.py).

            Assignee:
            luke.lovett Luke Lovett
            Reporter:
            srackham Stuart Rackham
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              Created:
              Updated:
              Resolved: