date?

lukeurtnowski

Yes, I have a date field on a form that writes to a mysql table. It comes in the form mm/dd/yyyy. How do I write it in the database the way it should (YYYY-mm-dd)?
Thanks...

Installer

$out_date = date('Y-m-d', strtotime($in_date));

Weedpacket

Assuming [man]strtotime[/man] can handle something ambiguous like "04/05/2006"....

Installer

It's not an assumption. It's based on the rules given here, along with code testing.

9/24/72 # Common U.S. writing.

Variations on the format also work:

$in_dates = array('04/05/06', '4/5/06', '04/05/2006', '4/5/2006', '4/5', '04/05');
foreach ($in_dates as $date) {
    echo date('Y-F-d', strtotime($date)) . '<br />' ;
}

2006-April-05
2006-April-05
2006-April-05
2006-April-05
2006-April-05
2006-April-05

Weedpacket

So it does .... now: do I assume that "04/05/2006" is unambiguous as a date ...? 😃 Remember, this is coming in from a form field, so really it could be anything.

ClarkF1

It is ambiguous.........to me in UK that says 4th May 2006....

When setting dates using strtotime I prefer to use the month name

"5 Apr 2006", "5 Apr", "5 April"and "5 April 2006" produce the desired results too.

Installer

Here's what the original poster said:

It comes in the form mm/dd/yyyy...

If that's still ambiguous to you, fine. It's not to me.

Weedpacket

No, no, I see what you're getting at. No need to get upset. I didn't know that strtotime() accepted that format since (for reasons that have already been given) I avoid any such dd/dd/dddd format to begin with.

Of course, the original poster also said:

a date field on a form

Which might mean that the field's value has already been checked and it has been confirmed that it is a valid date in mm/dd/yyyy format....

Installer

I wasn't upset; maybe a little frustrated at my own inability to explain something so simple. But, now, I'm glad to know that you learned something today.

lukeurtnowski

thank you Installer!

Houdini

I suppose that if the date field were derived from the form like below everything would work ok and then you could insert it into the database easily.

Month: <input type='text' name='month'>
Day: <input type='text' name='day'>
Year: <input type'text' name='year'>
<br />