Time/Date formatting

[CodeMama]

I have a form that collects a user selected date into three fields:

 

$startmonth

$startday

$startyear

 

yet above the form field I have a note telling users that they can not enter a date before a certain one using this little snippet:

   <?php 
                       $adstart  = date("d-M-Y", mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y")));
                       echo  ("$adstart"); 
                        ?>

 

This is a intranet app and the users still can't be trusted to play by the rules so I have to enter that date for them now, my question then is how can I break up that function there to enter it in the db in the month, day , year parts...?

 

[rhodesa]

$adstartstamp  = mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y"));
$startmonth = date("m",$adstartstamp);
$startday = date("d",$adstartstamp);
$startyear = date("Y",$adstartstamp);

[CodeMama]

Well almost, it would work but the date when broke down to the variables

$StartMonth

$StartDay etc are in the Unix box time

 

I tried changing it to :

    $adstartstamp  = date("d-M-Y", mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y")));
                        $StartMonth = date("m",$adstartstamp);
                        $StartDay = date("d",$adstartstamp);
                        $StartYear = date("Y",$adstartstamp);  

 

and the complete $adstartstamp echos the readable date but the other breakdown parts give the Unix time.  How do I fix that then I'm good to go.

Thanks

[rhodesa]

date() returns a formatted date. date()'s second argument needs to be unix timestamp.

 

i'm not sure exactly what you are asking, but try this:

$adstartstamp  = mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y"));
$adstart  = date("d-M-Y", $adstartstamp);
$startmonth = date("m",$adstartstamp);
$startday = date("d",$adstartstamp);
$startyear = date("Y",$adstartstamp);

 

[CodeMama]

I don't want the unix date format

I need to put in the regular format like : February etc

 

although yay for bosses, she just changed the task...oi.

Now I just have to keep the user from entering a date before what is allowed..this is a whole new can of worms.

[darkfreaks]

im sure you can edit this codemama:

 

<?php

$today = date("F j, Y, g:i a");                 // March 10, 2001, 5:16 pm
?>

[premiso]

Since no one pointed it out really, date the PHP Manual for date tells you all the variables you can use and what they will return.

[rhodesa]

well, let's start with the form...you probably want to build <SELECT> statements for the Month/Day/Year. Make the display value whatever you want, but have the option value be the numeric representation (1 for Jan, 2 for Feb, etc) you can also google for a JavaScript datepicker, there are tons out there.

 

next in your PHP, let's validate. so in the script the form is posted to, it would be something like this:

$submitted = mktime( 0,0,0, $_POST['month'] , $_POST['day'] , $_POST['year'] ); //date the user submitted as a timestamp
$min = mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y")); //2 days from now as a unix timestamp
if($submitted < $min){
  die("Date is too early");
}

 

next would be inserting it into the DB right? what format should it be for the database? aka, if you manually wrote an INSERT statement, what would it be like?

 

[CodeMama]

Hi Aaron,

Well it's something like this now, I got side tracked with attempting to use a php class calendar picker...

 

so I have this so far (not with the attempt at the use of the class)

<td align="left" nowrap><div class="CaptionReq"><B>*</B>Start Date:<br>Can NOT <br>be before <br>this date: <br>
                      <?php 
                      // $adstart  = date("d-M-Y", mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y")));
                      
              
                        $adstartstamp  = date("d-M-Y", mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y")));
					    $adstart  = date("d-M-Y", $adstartstamp);
                        $StartMonth = date("m",$adstartstamp);
                        $StartDay = date("d",$adstartstamp);
                        $StartYear = date("Y",$adstartstamp);  
                         //echo  ("$adstartstamp"); 
					 echo ("$StartMonth");
					 echo ("$StartDay");
					 echo ("$StartYear");
?>
                       </div></td>
					<td align="left">
						<SELECT NAME="StartMonth">
							<OPTION value="0">----MONTH----</OPTION>
							<OPTION VALUE="01">January</OPTION>
							<OPTION VALUE="02">February</OPTION>
							<OPTION VALUE="03">March</OPTION>
							<OPTION VALUE="04">April</OPTION>

as you can see the Unix box time is still on there I haven't tried the DarkFreak's suggestion yet...was working on yet my other stuck spot lol ...

[rhodesa]

the section of PHP code won't work. let me try to explain why:

<?php
//In the following line, mktime() produces a unix timestamp for 2 days from now
//That timestamp is then passed to date(), which formats it and stores it into $adstartstamp
$adstartstamp  = date("d-M-Y", mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y")));
//$adstartstamp now contains the string "25-Feb-2009"

//The next few lines all use date(), which as stated before expects a unix timestamp as a second argument
//But, you are passing it the string "25-Feb-2009", so it will fail
$adstart  = date("d-M-Y", $adstartstamp);
$StartMonth = date("m",$adstartstamp);
$StartDay = date("d",$adstartstamp);
$StartYear = date("Y",$adstartstamp);  
?>

 

do you see the problem now?

[CodeMama]

I see the problem but not the solution, and I have read (and read again) the php.net section about the date() function...

 

seems like there should be a way to say $startmonth = $adstart ("M")  or something to that effect

[rhodesa]

change

$adstartstamp  = date("d-M-Y", mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y")));

to

$adstartstamp  = mktime( 0,0,0, date("m") , date("d")+2, date("Y"));