Database timestamp

Question

Hello,

Couldn't really find the answer anywhere:

For a data integrity related requirement, we need to note down how time information is stored in the database for Jira Cloud. This can become complicated quite fast, especially when including daylight saving time.

As I understand, you can set a default user time zone in the System > General configuration > Default user time zone setting. This setting can be changed per user in their profile. This setting has an impact on how the time is shown to the user, i.e. how it is recalculated when looking at it from different timezones.

Does it capture this information as well (incl. DST) or does it use some form of uniformal UTC server time, which is then stored and recalculated from when showing any timestamp to a user based on that user's chosen timezone? But then, what happens when looking at a time from the past? This could change depending on whether the user is currently in daylight saving time or not (or when another user is looking at it from a region without daylight saving time).

Regards,

Frederik

sumukh_agu3y5 · Answer

Hi @Frederik ,

Time information is typically stored in the database in a uniform manner, Usally in Coordinated Universal Time Format(UTC), This ensure consistency and helps avoid issues related to daylight saving time changes or varying Time Zones.

This is the common practice in many systems as to avoid ambiguity and simplifies calculation.

Jira Cloud allows user to set their preffred time zones in their profile settings.

When a user views timestamp within Jira Cloud, The system recalculates the stored UTC time stamp into the users prefferred time zone before displaying it.

And When users view timestamp from the past, The system uses thr historical timezone information associated with the timestamp to determine how it should be displayed. This means if the daylight saving time rules have changed since the timestamp was recorded, the system will still display the timestamp accuratrely based onm the rules in place at the time of the event.

Thank You,

Sumukh

Mikael Sandberg · Answer

Hi @Frederik,

Date/time is stored as UTC in the database, you can see that if you do a API call that returns an issue, and is then calculated to the timezone that is set in the user's profile.