TimeTeller

Simple API that returns current date and time in JSON format over Sockets

How to Request Data

This microservice communicates using sockets. If you are running it locally, you must ensure the host is set to 127.0.0.1, and the port can be set to any port you like.

You're client must first connect to the server. Then you are able to send a request. The request must conform to the following:

• Sent data must be utf-8 encoded.
• Data can be any value in the range (-24, 24), exclusive. This value is the offset from UTC for the timezone you're requesting.
• Optionally, data can be any timezone shortcode (e.g. "PST" for Pacific Standard Time).

This repository contains an example test_client.py you can view.
Here is the basic code needed if your client is written in Python and using the Socket module:

 import socket
 import json

 HOST = "127.0.0.1"
 PORT = [same port as microservice]
 DATA = [any value in range (-24,24), exclusive, or any timezone shortcode, such as "PST"]
  
  with socket.socket(socket.AF_INET, socket.SOCK_STREAM) as s:
      s.connect((HOST, PORT))             # connect to socket server
      s.sendall(DATA.encode("utf-8"))     # send data

How to Receive Data

After sending a request to the service using the previous code snippet, the following code would be used to receive the response data:

      data = s.recv(1024)     # receive response
      response = json.loads(data.decode("utf-8"))   # decode and load JSON

The response sent by the microservice is built into a Python dictionary and sent as utf-8 encoded JSON. An example response demonstrating the JSON structure is:

{
 "year": 2024,
 "month": 3,
 "day": 12,
 "hour": 15,
 "minute": 33,
 "second": 53,
 "UTC_offset": 6
}

UML Diagram

sequenceDiagram
 App->>+Microservice: Establish connection
 App->>Microservice: Send request containing target timezone
 alt client sent shortcode
  Microservice->>Microservice: get UTC offset from dictionary
 end
 Microservice->>Microservice: Get current UTC date/time
 Microservice->>Microservice: Convert UTC date/time using offset
 Microservice-->>-App: Return JSON containing date/time 
 App->>App: Decode and load JSON

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