With the PHP date function you will get the date time of server on which the site is located. The only way to get the user time is to use JavaScript.
But I suggest you to, if your site has registration required then the best way is to ask the user while to have registration as a compulsory field. You can list various time zones in the register page and save that in the database. After this, if the user logs in to the site then you can set the default time zone for that session as per the users’ selected time zone.
You can set any specific time zone using the PHP function date_default_timezone_set. This sets the specified time zone for users.
Basically the users’ time zone is goes to the client side, so we must use JavaScript for this.
Below is the script to get users’ time zone using PHP and JavaScript.
<?php
#http://www.php.net/manual/en/timezones.php List of Time Zones
function showclienttime()
{
if(!isset($_COOKIE['GMT_bias']))
{
?>
<script type="text/javascript">
var Cookies = {};
Cookies.create = function (name, value, days) {
if (days) {
var date = new Date();
date.setTime(date.getTime() + (days * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000));
var expires = "; expires=" + date.toGMTString();
}
else {
var expires = "";
}
document.cookie = name + "=" + value + expires + "; path=/";
this[name] = value;
}
var now = new Date();
Cookies.create("GMT_bias",now.getTimezoneOffset(),1);
window.location = "<?php echo $_SERVER['PHP_SELF'];?>";
</script>
<?php
}
else {
$fct_clientbias = $_COOKIE['GMT_bias'];
}
$fct_servertimedata = gettimeofday();
$fct_servertime = $fct_servertimedata['sec'];
$fct_serverbias = $fct_servertimedata['minuteswest'];
$fct_totalbias = $fct_serverbias – $fct_clientbias;
$fct_totalbias = $fct_totalbias * 60;
$fct_clienttimestamp = $fct_servertime + $fct_totalbias;
$fct_time = time();
$fct_year = strftime("%Y", $fct_clienttimestamp);
$fct_month = strftime("%B", $fct_clienttimestamp);
$fct_day = strftime("%d", $fct_clienttimestamp);
$fct_hour = strftime("%I", $fct_clienttimestamp);
$fct_minute = strftime("%M", $fct_clienttimestamp);
$fct_second = strftime("%S", $fct_clienttimestamp);
$fct_am_pm = strftime("%p", $fct_clienttimestamp);
echo $fct_day.", ".$fct_month." ".$fct_year." ( ".$fct_hour.":".$fct_minute.":".$fct_second." ".$fct_am_pm." )";
}
showclienttime();
?>
But as per my point of view, it’s better to ask to the users if registration is mandatory in your project.