Crossbrowser php date to javascript date? - php

Question

I am building a JavaScript countdown, that needs to rely on the server time but I cant manage to transfers the php time to javascript in a crossbrowser manner. This workes well in all Mordern browsers, but brakes in older ones (Date not defined). If I go with date("Y-m-d H:i:s) instead of date("Y-m-d\TH:i:s\Z) it works better but not in IE10
<?php
switch ($day) {
case 'Sat':
$start = "10";
$stop = "16";
break;
case 'Sun':
$start = "11";
$stop = "16";
break;
default:
$start = "10";
$stop = "19";
break;
}
?>
<script>
jQuery(function(){
var open = new Date("<?php echo date("Y-m-d\TH:i:s\Z",strtotime("today {$start}:00:00")); ?>");
var end = new Date("<?php echo date("Y-m-d\TH:i:s\Z",strtotime("today {$stop}:00:00")); ?>");
var _second = 1000;
var _minute = _second * 60;
var _hour = _minute * 60;
var _day = _hour * 24;
var start = new Date("<?php echo date("Y-m-d\TH:i:s\Z"); ?>") ;
});
</script>

Answer 1

The only format officially recognized by ECMAScript/JavaScript is ISO 8601 Extended:
The format is as follows: YYYY-MM-DDTHH:mm:ss.sssZ
But, this is new with ECMAScript 5. Prior versions left support up to each vendor to decide.
You could try using timestamps rather than strings.
var open = new Date(<?php echo strtotime("today {$start}:00:00") * 1000; ?>);
// ...
var start = new Date(<?php echo time() * 1000; ?>);
Both JavaScript and PHP use UTC-based timestamps, just with the difference of seconds (PHP) vs. milliseconds (JS).

Answer 2

Firstly, Javascript date() is accept the milliseconds, or dateString.
The milliseconds similar to php time().
The dateString should be used this format: October 13, 2012 11:13:00
By you case, I suggest using strtotime() or time() to return the timestamp, but you need * 1000 before pass to javascript.
Ref: W3schools - Date Object Reference