ISO8601 (JSON) timestamp support for Date.parse

date_parse.coffee

# Older browsers do not support ISO8601 (JSON) timestamps in Date.parse
if isNaN Date.parse "2011-01-01T12:00:00-05:00"
  parse = Date.parse
  iso8601 = /^(\d{4})-(\d{2})-(\d{2})T(\d{2}):(\d{2}):(\d{2})(Z|[-+]?[\d:]+)$/

  Date.parse = (dateString) ->
    dateString = dateString.toString()
    if matches = dateString.match iso8601
      [_, year, month, day, hour, minute, second, zone] = matches
      offset = zone.replace(":", "") if zone isnt "Z"
      dateString = "#{year}/#{month}/#{day} #{hour}:#{minute}:#{second} GMT#{[offset]}"
    parse dateString

Parsing the full range of valid date time string values as defined by ES 5.1 section 15.9.1.15 requires this monstrosity: /^(\d{4})(?:-(\d{2})(?:-(\d{2})(?:T(\d{2}):(\d{2})(?::(\d{2})(?:\.\d{3})?)?(Z|(?:[-+]\d{2}:\d{2}))?)?)?)?$/. (I'm not particularly adept at RegExps, so there's likely a better way to write that).

It preserves the seven capturing groups that you're currently using to parse the provided date time string, but, if you'd like to use it, you'll need to slightly modify offset and dateString:

offset = zone.replace(":", "") if zone? and zone isnt "Z"
"#{year}/#{month || 1}/#{day || 1} #{hour || 1}:#{minute || 1}:#{second || 1} GMT#{[offset]}"

Edit: Slightly improved the RegExp...