README

A wrapper to enumerate PHP 5.6+, 7.x, 8.x timezones in a simplified way for use in various ways.

This is done with Laravel 5.5+ in mind - YMMV elsewhere.

Basics

• Creates timezone arrays based on PHP's supported timezones with optional grouping by region
• Lists are sorted by offset from high (+14:00) to low (-11:00)
• Optionally group the arrays (multi-dim associated array) by region
  • sorting is the same, but only inside each region
• For either case, return those as:
  • php arrays for whatever use your heart desires
  • HTML select list
• 2 utility functions for converting to/from UTC

Installation

You can install this package using Composer.

$ composer require jessedp/php-timezones

Using version ^0.2.0 for jessedp/php-timezones
./composer.json has been updated
    ...

Usage

1. Render a timezone HTML Select list

The method Timezones::create() has three parameters:

Timezones::create($name, $selected, $opts);

• $name required - the name of the select element
• $selected - sets the selected value of list box, assuming the a value with the option exists
• $opts an array of options as key=>value:
  • attr => array of key=>value pairs to be included in the select element (ie, 'id', 'class', etc.)
  • withregions => _boolean whether or not to use option groups for the regions/continents (defaults to false)
  • regions => array (of strings) specifying the region(s) to include

Basic Example

Timezones::create('timezone');

Returns a string similar to:

<select name="timezone">
  ...
  <option value="Africa/Abidjan">(GMT/UTC + 00:00) Abidjan</option>
  <option value="Africa/Accra">(GMT/UTC + 00:00) Accra</option>
  ...
</select>

"Selected" Example

Same as above, but Asia/Ho_Chi_Minh will be selected by default

Timezones::create('timezone', 'Asia/Ho_Chi_Minh');

"Options" Example

You may also add multiple attributes with an array.

Timezones::create('timezone', null,
            ['attr'=>[
             'id'    => 'my_id',
             'class' => 'form-control'
            ]
        ]);

Which gives us:

<select name="timezone" id="my_id" class="form-control">
  <option value="Pacific/Apia">
    (GMT/UTC + 14:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Pacific/Apia
  </option>
  <option value="Pacific/Kiritimati">
    (GMT/UTC + 14:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Pacific/Kiritimati
  </option>
  ...
  <option value="Asia/Shanghai">
    (GMT/UTC + 08:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Asia/Shanghai
  </option>
  <option value="Asia/Singapore">
    (GMT/UTC + 08:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Asia/Singapore
  </option>
  <option value="Asia/Taipei">
    (GMT/UTC + 08:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Asia/Taipei
  </option>
  ...
  <option value="America/New_York">
    (GMT/UTC − 05:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;America/New York
  </option>
  ...
</select>

"Regions/Grouping" Example

Say you want the option groups but only a couple regions...

Timezones::create('timezone',null,
                    ['attr'=>['class'=>'form-control'],
                    'with_regions'=>true,
                    'regions'=>['Africa','America']
                    ])

This will return a string similar to the following:

<select name="timezone" class="form-control">
  <optgroup label="Africa">
    <option value="Africa/Addis_Ababa">
      (GMT/UTC + 03:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Addis Ababa
    </option>
    <option value="Africa/Asmara">
      (GMT/UTC + 03:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Asmara
    </option>
    ...
  </optgroup>
  <optgroup label="America">
    ...
    <option value="America/Noronha">
      (GMT/UTC − 02:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Noronha
    </option>
    ...
    <option value="America/Argentina/Buenos_Aires">
      (GMT/UTC − 03:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Argentina/Buenos Aires
    </option>
    ...
    <option value="America/New_York">
      (GMT/UTC − 05:00)&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;New York
    </option>
    ...
  </optgroup>
</select>

2. Render a timezone array

You can also render timezone list as an array. To do so, just use the Timezones::toArray() method.

Example in Laravel:

$timezone_list = Timezones::toArray();

3. Utility methods

The package includes two methods that make it easy to deal with displaying and storing timezones, convertFromUTC() and convertToUTC() :

Each function accepts two required parameters and a third optional parameter dealing with the format of the returned timestamp.

    Timezones::convertFromUTC($timestamp, $timezone, $format);
    Timezones::convertToUTC($timestamp, $timezone, $format);

The first parameter accepts a timestamp, the second accepts the name of the timezone that you are converting to/from. The option values associated with the timezones included in the select form builder can be plugged into here as is. Alternatively, you can use any of PHP's supported timezones.

The third parameter is optional, and default is set to 'Y-m-d H:i:s' , which is how Laravel natively stores datetimes into the database (the created_at and updated_at columns). If you're using this for display purposes, you may find including '(e)' in the format string which displays the timezone.

Thanks to

This is based off some lovely work by:

• https://github.com/JackieDo/Timezone-List
• https://github.com/camroncade/timezone

The Spatie group and specifically the laravel-analytics project I used as inspiration copied for structure