Setting Time Zone Options and Related Date Fields in Record Field Properties

When a record includes a time or datetime field, choose whether the PeopleSoft system displays the time in the system’s base time zone, or in another time zone such as a time zone that corresponds to the user’s location. Set this option for all time and datetime fields.

Understanding Related Date Fields

The purpose of a related date field is for accounting for daylight saving time. Related date fields only apply to time fields, not datetime fields. If the user has set their personalization to show times in their local time zone, then the runtime engine calculates the offset of the local time zone from the database time zone and applies that offset to the value before displaying it.

Similarly it does the reverse when converting a user entered time back to database time. To calculate the offset between time zones the system must know if daylight saving time is in effect, so you must provide the date. For a datetime field this is no problem, but for a time field the system needs only the current date. This can lead to some problems where someone enters data, then comes back to look at it at a later date and sees it has shifted by an hour because daylight saving time has gone into affect in the meantime. Related dates resolve this problem.

When there is a related date, that date value is used to calculate the offset between the local and database time zones, therefore the calculation will always be the same and the time value won't change depending on when you look at it. Furthermore the related date field will look at the time field that is related to it to determine if it needs to be offset.

For example, lets say the database time zone is pacific standard time (PST), and the local time zone is eastern standard time (EST). If you enter 1:00 a.m. into a time field and 01/01/2000 into the date field related to that time, the time will be converted to 10:00 p.m. PST internally and for saving to the database, and the date will be converted to 12/31/1999, because 1:00 a.m. EST is 10 p.m. PST of the previous day. The offset is minus three hours.

Setting the Time Zone to Control Display Times

To set the time zone that controls the display time:

  1. In Application Designer, open the record, and open the Record Field Properties dialog box for the time field by double-clicking the field that displays the time.

    The Use tab appears.

  2. In the Time Zone group box, set the time zone property.

    If you leave the Specified Time Zone check box clear, the time appears in the database’s base time zone by default, unless a user specifies a local time zone in My Personalizations, Regional Options to display times in the user’s local time zone.

    If you select the Specified Time Zone check box, the field displays the time according to the time zone that is specified in the Time Zone Control Field field. You must specify a time zone control field in this record.

    A single time zone control field can control multiple time and datetime fields on the record. Using a single control field causes all times to appear in the same time zone. If you want multiple time or datetime fields to appear in different time zones, you need separate control fields for each of them.

    You may want to set the default value of the time zone field to %ClientTimeZone or %BaseTimeZone. However, the default time zone is used only when the transaction is created. Because the time zone is saved along with the transaction itself, future users who access the transaction will see the time relative to that time zone.

  3. Select which related date field in the current record stores the calendar date to which this field should be adjusted.

  4. Click OK.