Log dates

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sirius Tas
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Log dates

Post by sirius Tas » 01 February 21 3:29 am

A query on why GA adds 1 day to imported GC caches when in fact Groundspeak Seattle is 19 hrs in arrears to EDST.
e.g. imported 23 GC caches on the 31st Jan 2021...dated as such on GC...but GA somehow adds 1 day to make the finds on the 1st Feb.
Makes no sense as USA time is 19hrs in arrears.
Very annoying if you keep a hard copy of finds and if you want to check back in the future.
Surely caches imported on the same day as found should get the same found date???

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caughtatwork
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Re: Log dates

Post by caughtatwork » 01 February 21 9:24 am

We don't.

This is from GC and my log.
https://www.geocaching.com/seek/log.asp ... 4f121ff6f2
Sunday, 13 August 2017
Found by caughtatwork at 15:04 on 13/08/2017

This is from the GPX file.
<groundspeak:date>2017-08-13T19:00:00Z</groundspeak:date>

This is at GCA.
13th August 2017
Found by caughtatwork at 15:04 on 13/08/2017

If I were to convert 19:00:00Z to AEST (K) I would end up with the 14th which is wrong. I know I found this on the Sunday, not the Monday, so it's a problem with when GC determine the log date.

GC actually have a bug, depending on what time you log it at their site, they set the wrong date. It's a known issue at their end but it's been over a decade and no fix.
https://forums.geocaching.com/GC/index. ... -is-wrong/

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sirius Tas
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Re: Log dates

Post by sirius Tas » 01 February 21 10:46 am

Thanks for update...all very confusing.

Importing the same file into GSAK gives the correct date...so using GC logged date.

Does anyone know what the cut off time is??
Maybe anything loggged on GC after 7pm gets the added day.

Will do a test on future logs to find out the actual cut off time.

Many thanks

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caughtatwork
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Re: Log dates

Post by caughtatwork » 01 February 21 11:35 am

GASK has an ugly hack that tries to correct the date, but is dependent on the data being wrong in a certain way.
https://gsak.net/help/hs46140.htm
https://gsak.net/board/index.php?s=f78d ... ntry126034

Best effort would be to gang up and convince Groundspeak to correct a decades old bug that they know about and either cannot or will not address.

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sirius Tas
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Re: Log dates

Post by sirius Tas » 01 February 21 12:12 pm

Yep...appreciate your update.
I've raised issues before with them but unfortunately we don't get the same service that we're lucky to get from GA....they wont even reply.

Looking at your log in August..i.e. standard time...they've added 4 hrs to your log time.
I'm guessing but DST would add 5 hrs during summer, giving a cut off at 7pm.
I'll do a trial and find out.

Appreciate your replies....sorry for blaming GA too...should have known better.

Regards
Sirius

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Chwiliwr
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Re: Log dates

Post by Chwiliwr » 01 February 21 1:17 pm

From a discussion I had with a Lackey whilst still a reviewer the date/time on the website is GMT plus or minus the timezone of where the cache is physically located which is OK when the log is done via an app at the time of the find as it makes what you see when viewing the cache on the website correct.

However there are issues when the log is not done at the time or the log is done from a different timezone by something other than the various APPS like GSAK.

The issue is further compounded when what you have is the GPX download direct from the website which was never completely altered to match what they did with the base website system. They did promise to fix this when they next looked at the GPX stuff but as far as I know that hasn't happened yet.

If you look at the source of GC8KZYD it correctly shows 31st as both the date of the find and the date of entry for the log:
"Created":"31 Jan 21","Visited":"31 Jan 21","UserName":"sirius Tas"

However the downloaded GPX from that listing shows:
<groundspeak:date>2021-02-01T05:59:10Z</groundspeak:date>
BTW GSAK imports the date correctly from this downloaded GPX due to their fudge code and therefore will output a GPX with the correct date.
<groundspeak:date>2021-01-31T21:59:10Z</groundspeak:date>

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sirius Tas
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Re: Log dates

Post by sirius Tas » 01 February 21 1:36 pm

Many thanks for that. Getting my head around it now.
Once its clear what the cut off time is I'll be able to make the logging times to suit.
I know caches logged in the afternoon display dates correctly...so assuming 7pm is the cut off during summer.
Next few logs will sort it out.
Getting GC to change anything is next to impossible.
Cheers and thanks

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Re: Log dates

Post by Team737 » 01 February 21 7:22 pm

caughtatwork wrote:
01 February 21 9:24 am
....
GC actually have a bug, depending on what time you log it at their site, they set the wrong date. It's a known issue at their end but it's been over a decade and no fix.
....
At least with normal caches you can fix the date error later on, with Adventure Labs you're in trouble (if you need that date for some reason)....

Laighside Legends
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Re: Log dates

Post by Laighside Legends » 02 February 21 2:26 pm

This was my attempt at explaining the problem a few years ago: https://wiki.geocaching.com.au/wiki/Upl ... ate_Issues
The "time" of your log depends on what software or app you used to submit the log.

However, they have since changed how logs on event caches work. The time on event logs are set depending on the listed time of the event, not 20:00:00
But they all seem to be set about 8 hours ahead of the listed event time (in SA). I don't think 8 hours ahead of SA is even a valid timezone anywhere so why they have chosen that is a mystery to me.

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Richary
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Re: Log dates

Post by Richary » 02 February 21 8:04 pm

It's a bit of a pain for those of us who don't log via an app in the field. Which I very rarely do unless marking a FTF to let people know it is gone. Perhaps it is part of being an old school cacher who likes to write a decent log rather than just TFTC. And at 56 years old with eyesight not as good as it used to be and fat fingers, I find it easier to write a decent log on the PC at home after a day's caching than try to type something long and meaningful on the phone. So that might be late afternoon, or it could be in the evening if I have a number to do. Or if a trip with limited internet coverage it might even be a few days later (though that is rare).

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