Report Log Timestamps and Time Zones

Timestamps in a report log are determined by the clock on the license server machine. The times are converted from the time zone of the license server machine and stored in the report log in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), also known as Universal Time (UTC). Therefore, the data in a report log is insensitive to time zones, and you can generate a report using report logs that were written on machines in different time zones without accounting for time differences. Reports show time using the time zone set on the machine on which the report is generated. FlexNet Manager for Engineering Applications reporting translates times in UTC from the report log using the offset for the time zone of the machine on which FlexNet Manager for Engineering Applications reporting is running.

For example, if you have an event in a report log that was written at 1:00 p.m. by a vendor daemon running on a license server in the US Eastern time zone, its timestamp in the report log would be written as 6:00 p.m. GMT. If an event in a report log was written at 10:00 a.m. by a vendor daemon running on a license server in the US Pacific time zone, its timestamp would also be written as 6:00 p.m. GMT. If those two report logs were used to generate a report in the US Pacific time zone, those two events would both be reported at 10:00 a.m. If the same report were generated on a computer in the US Eastern time zone, the events would both be reported at 1:00 p.m.

Occasionally, times in reports may differ from what you expect. These differences may be caused by one of the following scenarios:

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The time zone on the license server machine is set incorrectly. If the time zone is not set correctly and the system clock has been set to show local time, this introduces an error into the UTC timestamps recorded in the report log.

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The time zone on the machine where report is running is set incorrectly. Even if the clock time looks correct, the time zone may not be set correctly.