How can I convert datetime microformat to local time in javascript?

Question

I have a page that is currently using the datetime microformat to display a timestamp, but I have only been showing the human-readable time for my own time zone:

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Answer 1

EcmaScript formalized the addition of an ISO-8601 style string as an imput for a JavaScript date. Since most JS implementations don't support this, I created a wrapper to the Date object, that has this functionality. If you set the title tags to output in UTC/GMT/Z/Zulu offset, you can use my EcmaScript 5 extensions for JS's Date object.

For DateTime values that are to be used in client-side scripts, I generally try to always do the following. Store date+time in UTC zone (even in databases). Transmit date-times in UTC zone. From client to server, you can use the .toISOString() method in the above link. From server-to client this is relatively easy.

Via jQuery (with extension):

$('.published').each(function(){
  var dtm = new Date(this.title);
  if (!isNaN(dtm)) {
    this.text(dtm.toString());
  }
});

I don't recall if I added support for non-utc date-times in the input, but wouldn't be too hard to account for them.

Answer 2

Here is code of mine that parses an ISO timestamp:

function isoDateStringToDate (datestr) {
  if (! this.re) {
    // The date in YYYY-MM-DD or YYYYMMDD format
    var datere = "(\\d{4})-?(\\d{2})-?(\\d{2})";
    // The time in HH:MM:SS[.uuuu] or HHMMSS[.uuuu] format
    var timere = "(\\d{2}):?(\\d{2}):?(\\d{2}(?:\\.\\d+)?)";
    // The timezone as Z or in +HH[:MM] or -HH[:MM] format
    var tzre = "(Z|(?:\\+|-)\\d{2}(?:\\:\\d{2})?)?";
    this.re = new RegExp("^" + datere + "[ T]" + timere + tzre + "$");
  }

  var matches = this.re.exec(datestr);
  if (! matches)
    return null;

  var year = matches[1];
  var month = matches[2] - 1;
  var day = matches[3];
  var hour = matches[4];
  var minute = matches[5];
  var second = Math.floor(matches[6]);
  var ms = matches[6] - second;
  var tz = matches[7];
  var ms = 0;
  var offset = 0;

  if (tz && tz != "Z") {
    var tzmatches = tz.match(/^(\+|-)(\d{2})(\:(\d{2}))$/);
    if (tzmatches) {
      offset = Number(tzmatches[2]) * 60 + Number(tzmatches[4]);
      if (tzmatches[1] == "-")
        offset = -offset;
    }
  }

  offset *= 60 * 1000;
  var dateval = Date.UTC(year, month, day, hour, minute, second, ms) - offset;

  return new Date(dateval);
}

Unfortunately, it doesn't handle timezone abbreviations either. You would have to modify the "tzre" expression to accept letters, and the only solution I know of to deal with timezone abbreviations in Javascript is to have a look-up table which you keep up to date manually in the event of changes to regional daylight savings times.