Alright, I got the php part to work but I am now having trouble with MySQL now().

Here is the code that I have so far:

PHP Code:
echo "<p>PHP 1: ".date("Y-m-d h:i:s")."</p>"; // outputs system time, ok

$q = "select now()";
$r = mysql_query($q);
$d = mysql_fetch_assoc($r);
echo "<p>MySQL 1: ".$d['now()']."</p>"; // outputs system time, ok

putenv("TZ=America/Chicago"); // change php timezone
echo "<p>PHP 2: ".date("Y-m-d h:i:s")."</p>"; // outputs my timezone, ok

$q = "select now()";
$r = mysql_query($q);
$d = mysql_fetch_assoc($r);
echo "<p>MySQL 2: ".$d['now()']."</p>"; // outputs system time, didn't expect this to work for my timezone but why not try

$q = "set time_zone = '-5:00'"; // change mysql timezone
$r = mysql_query($q);

$q = "select now()";
$r = mysql_query($q);
$d = mysql_fetch_assoc($r);
echo "<p>MySQL 3: ".$d['now()']."</p>"; // outputs my timezone, ok 
Per the MySQL docs, I should be able to tell MySQL the timezone that I am in by name, so instead of writing:
PHP Code:
$q = "set time_zone = '-5:00'"; 
I should be able to write:

PHP Code:
$q = "set time_zone = 'America/Chicago'"; 
or:

PHP Code:
$q = "set time_zone = 'US/Central'"; 
However, both of those attempts when using names fail and MySQL complains about them.

Per MySQL doc:
Named time zones can be used only if the time zone information tables in the mysql database have been created and populated.

Can we get these tables loaded or is there another solution to get now() to work as expected?