Question

I am getting the “LastWriteTime” of my executable and comparing it to an internal DateTime that I have set. If the LastWriteTime is less than or equal to the internal DateTime then I will clear two tables from a database.

This code works great for me in the Pacific Time Zone. But if a user is in another time zone, (example 4 hours ahead of me), then it does not work because the “LastWriteTime” returns the time converted to their time zone. For example, I am looking for the value of “12/12/2012 8:38:12 AM” and if they are 4 hours ahead of me, this value gets automatically changed to “12/12/2012 12:38:12 PM” on their systems.

Can someone please show me what I should modify in my code to take into account for different time zones so the “LastWriteTime” and my ‘build2023_EXE_Date’ variable both return the same Date/Time so my comparision of the two date/time values don’t fail regardless of what time zone my end user is in?

I am using .NET 3.5, not .Net 4.x

//http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1600962/displaying-the-build-date
string w_file = "MyEXE.exe";
string w_directory = Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.ApplicationData) +
                       Path.DirectorySeparatorChar + "MyEXE";

DateTime currentExeTime = File.GetLastWriteTime(System.IO.Path.Combine(w_directory, w_file));


DateTime build2023_EXE_Date = new DateTime(2012, 12, 12, 8, 38, 12); //"12/12/2012 8:38:12 AM"

//We need to truncate the millisecond time off of the EXE LastWriteTime
//or else when we compare to our internal DateTime build2323_EXE_Date value,
//it will not match
//http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1004698/how-to-truncate-milliseconds-off-of-a-net-datetime
currentExeTime = new DateTime(
     currentExeTime.Ticks - (currentExeTime.Ticks % TimeSpan.TicksPerSecond),
            currentExeTime.Kind
            );

if (currentExeTime <= build2023_EXE_Date) //If previous build matches or is before the Build 2023 date then clear these two tables.
{
    //This will fail the comparision if the user is in a different time zone than me.
    //Clear tables
}

Answer 1

Use the DateTime ToUniversalTime() method