Date post from frontend to web api issue

Question

I have some calendar with hour and minute textbox field for capturing datetime in my angular application.

This gets converted to full date like below:

accidentVM.AccidentNotificationDateFull = new Date(accidentVM.AccidentNotificationDate.getFullYear(), accidentVM.AccidentNotificationDate.getMonth(), accidentVM.AccidentNotificationDate.getDate(),
                                                parseInt(accidentVM.AccidentNotificationHour), parseInt(accidentVM.AccidentNotificationMinute), 0);
var notificationDate = accidentVM.AccidentNotificationDateFull;

Now if I post this notificationDate as input in web api and it's becoming different when it reaches to web api because javascript is appending my local timezone (which is + 5:30) in my case.

To avoid this

I did a adjustment in GMT from client side.This is basically taking note of the gmt offset and subtracting or adding it from the input so that it becomes again correct when it reaches to server.

the function looks like

this.convertDate = function (dateVM) {               
                var dateObj = dateVM;
                if (new Date().getTimezoneOffset() < 0) {
                    dateVM = new Date(dateObj.setTime(dateObj.getTime() - new Date().getTimezoneOffset() * 60 * 1000));
                }
                else {
                    dateVM = new Date(dateObj.setTime(dateObj.getTime() + new Date().getTimezoneOffset() * 60 * 1000));
                }                
};

This solved the problem and I see now the correct date time getting posted,however it still appends a T at the end while reaches in server.

See the inputs here from front end

and when it reaches in web api it becomes

and corresponding fiddler request

If you have noticed it's becoming UTC or it's appending Z at the end.

My questing is that if there is any way I can get rid of Z or more specifically DateTime kind should be unspecified/local?

Answer 1

I have added below local date format settings in WebApiConfig class.This will tell web api json formatters to convert to local timezone.

var jsonFormatter = config.Formatters.JsonFormatter;
jsonFormatter.SerializerSettings.DateTimeZoneHandling = DateTimeZoneHandling.Local;

thus I don't need the explicit client side maneuvering of GMT.