What is timezone-mock?
The 'timezone-mock' npm package allows developers to mock the system timezone in their Node.js applications. This is particularly useful for testing code that is sensitive to timezones without having to change the system timezone.
What are timezone-mock's main functionalities?
Mocking the System Timezone
This feature allows you to set a specific timezone for your Node.js application. The code sample demonstrates how to register the 'US/Pacific' timezone and then log the current date and time in that timezone.
const timezoneMock = require('timezone-mock');
timezoneMock.register('US/Pacific');
console.log(new Date().toString()); // Outputs date in US/Pacific timezone
Unregistering the Mocked Timezone
This feature allows you to unregister the mocked timezone and revert back to the system's default timezone. The code sample demonstrates how to unregister the 'US/Pacific' timezone and log the current date and time in the system's default timezone.
const timezoneMock = require('timezone-mock');
timezoneMock.register('US/Pacific');
console.log(new Date().toString()); // Outputs date in US/Pacific timezone
timezoneMock.unregister();
console.log(new Date().toString()); // Outputs date in the system's default timezone
Other packages similar to timezone-mock
mockdate
The 'mockdate' package allows you to mock the current date and time in your Node.js applications. Unlike 'timezone-mock', which focuses on timezones, 'mockdate' is more about setting a specific date and time for testing purposes.
sinon
The 'sinon' package is a comprehensive library for creating spies, stubs, and mocks in JavaScript. While it is not specifically focused on timezones, it can be used to mock dates and times, among other functionalities. It is more versatile but also more complex compared to 'timezone-mock'.
timezone-mock
A JavaScript library to mock the local timezone.
This module is useful for testing that code works correctly when run in
other timezones, especially those which have Daylight Saving Time if the
timezone of your test system does not.
When register
is called, it replaces the global Date constructor with
a mocked Date object which behaves as if it is in the specified timezone.
Note: Future timezone transitions are likely to change due to laws, etc. Make
sure to always test using specific dates in the past. The timezone data used by
timezone-mock 1.0.4+
should be up accurate for all times through the end of 2018.
Note: Node v8.0.0 changed how the string "YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS" is interpreted.
It was previously interpreted as a UTC date, but now is a local date. If your
code is using dates of this format, results will be inconsistent. timezone-mock
treats them as a local date, so that it behaves consistently with new versions
of Node, but that means if you run the tests in here on old versions of node,
or use the mock on old versions of node, the tests may not be accurate (just
for parsing dates in the aforementioned format).
Usage Example
var assert = require('assert');
var timezone_mock = require('timezone-mock');
function buggyCode() {
return new Date('2015-01-01 12:00:00').getTime();
}
var result_local = buggyCode();
timezone_mock.register('US/Pacific');
var result_pacific = buggyCode();
timezone_mock.register('US/Eastern');
var result_eastern = buggyCode();
assert.equal(result_local, result_pacific);
assert.equal(result_pacific, result_eastern);
API
timezone_mock.register(timezone)
- Replace the global Date object with a mocked one for
the specified timezone. Defaults to 'US/Pacific' if no timezone is specified.timezone_mock.unregister()
- Return to normal Date object behaviortimezone_mock._Date
- access to the original Date object for testing. Available after register
is called, and it's the Date
object of the provided global/window context.timezone_mock.options({ fallbackFn })
- Option to provide a fallback function when timezone-mock
fails to parse.
Supported Timezones
Currently supported timezones are:
- US/Pacific
- US/Eastern
- Brazil/East
- UTC
- Europe/London
- Australia/Adelaide
I found that testing on these were enough to ensure code worked in
all timezones (important factor is to test on a timezone with Daylight Saving
Time if your local timezone does not). Brazil/East has the unique characteristic
of having the DST transition happen right at midnight, so code that sets a Date
object to midnight on a particular day and then does operations on that Date
object is especially vulnerable in that timezone. Europe/London is included as
a timezone that is a positive offset from UTC, and Australia/Adelaide as one that
has a large positive and non-integral offset (+9.5/+10.5).
Supported GMT Offsets
Note: the Etc/GMT
timezones work the opposite of how one might expect, the Etc/GMT+5
timezone is equivalent to US Eastern Standard Time (UTC-5).
Currently supported GMT offsets are:
- Etc/GMT+12
- Etc/GMT+11
- Etc/GMT+10
- Etc/GMT+9
- Etc/GMT+8
- Etc/GMT+7
- Etc/GMT+6
- Etc/GMT+5
- Etc/GMT+4
- Etc/GMT+3
- Etc/GMT+2
- Etc/GMT+1
- Etc/GMT+0
- Etc/GMT
- Etc/GMT-0
- Etc/GMT-1
- Etc/GMT-2
- Etc/GMT-3
- Etc/GMT-4
- Etc/GMT-5
- Etc/GMT-6
- Etc/GMT-7
- Etc/GMT-8
- Etc/GMT-9
- Etc/GMT-10
- Etc/GMT-11
- Etc/GMT-12
- Etc/GMT-13
- Etc/GMT-14
GMT offsets can be used to test if UTC times fall on particular local calendar days.
Note: Etc/GMT+0
, Etc/GMT
, and Etc/GMT-0
all represent the same offset and are
equivalent to the UTC
time zone.
Status
The behavior of toLocaleString()
has changed in v1.3.0 to more closely match Node's
behavior, but only works on Node v14+. Use v1.2.2 for the old behavior. See note below.
Most Date member functions are supported except for some conversions to
locale-specific date strings. These are mocked in a way that may only work
reliably on Node v14+. Note that using locale-specific formatting is often
device- and browser-dependant, so any use of these in tests may indicate a
potential bug.
With non-DST timezones, it should behave identically to the native Javascript
Date object. With DST timezones, it may sometimes behave slightly differently
when given an ambiguous date string (e.g. "2014-11-02 01:00:00" in "US/Pacific",
is treated as 1AM PDT instead of 1AM PST - same clock time, utc timestamp off by
an hour).