PHP - DateTime Formatting | PHP-DateTime-Demo | Explained
DateTime_Demo.php PHP SOURCE CODE:
<?php
if( $_GET["color"] !==""){
// echo "GET['color'] = " . $_GET["color"] ;
$BodyColor = $_GET["color"] ;
}else{ $BodyColor = 'black' ;}
if( $_GET["bgcolor"] !==""){
// echo "GET['bgcolor'] = " . $_GET["bgcolor"] ;
$BGColor = $_GET["bgcolor"] ;
if(is_numeric($BGColor)){
$BGColor = "#".$_GET["bgcolor"] ;
}
}else{ $BGColor = 'transparent' ;}
$getTime = $_SERVER['REQUEST_TIME'] ;
?>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang= "en">
<head>
<title>PHP DateTime Format Demo Page</title>
<meta charset = "UTF-8">
<meta copyright = "(c)Kirk Siqveland - Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0">
<style>
body {
padding: 10px ;
color: <?php echo $BodyColor?> ;
background-color: <?php echo $BGColor?> ;
}
tab {
display: inline-block ;
width: 2em ;
}
.center {text-align: center;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1>PHP DateTime Format Demo Page</h1>
<strong>Let's start by getting a UNIX EPOCH Time in Integer format:</strong>
<br/><br/><br/>
In PHP the function - time()<br/>
Returns the current date and time, measured in the number of seconds since the Unix Epoch start date/time<br/>
January 1 1970 00:00:00 GMT<br/><br/>
GMT is now considered a TimeZone, UTC is a Time Standard that coincides with GMT Time (No Daylight Savings)<br/>
The Unix Epoch assumes UTC, which means no offsets.<br/><br/>
The current <strong>time()</strong> is: <?php echo time();?> <br/><br/>
We can also query the Server Explicitly:<br/>
$serverTime = $_SERVER['REQUEST_TIME'];<br/>
This returns: <strong><?php echo $_SERVER['REQUEST_TIME'];?></strong><br/><br/>
We can use date() to set the display format of an EPOCH integer value, making it human-readable:<br/>
date() takes two parameters, the first identifies the format we want, the second is the EPOCH integer.<br/>
If you leave off the EPOCH value, PHP uses the current date-time (from your server).<br/><br/>
date('r'); returns: <strong><?php echo date('r');?></strong><br/><br/>
date('r',time()); returns: <strong><?php echo date('r',time());?></strong><br/><br/>
We can set a specific date-time using the Epoch value:<br/>
date('r', 327511920 ); returns: <strong><?php echo date('r', 327511920);?></strong><br/><br/>
The last segment of this date format indicate TimeZone offset,<br/>
which defaults to your server's default TimeZone.<br/><br/>
For Simple representation we can work with an EPOCH value and date() for formatting.
<br/><br/><hr/><br/><br/>
<h3>But if we want to manipulate the date, time or Time Zone values we need a DateTime object.</h3>
Like any object we just need to create it:<br/>
$dto_now = new DateTime([date-time], [timezone]) ; //both paramaters are optional<br/>
or<br/>
$dto_now = date_create([date-time], [timezone]); //both paramaters are optional<br/><br/>
Both the date_create() and the new DateTime() functions use a string-parser in PHP to interpret the [date-time]<br/>
There is a good bit of flexibility but something like:<br/><br/>
// $ts = '01-01-1970 00:00:01 +0000' ; // Epoch Value of 1<br/>
// $ts = '1980-05-18 08:32 -0700' ; // May 18, 1980 at 8:32 a.m.<br/>
// $ts = '06-12-1895 13:55:01 +0100' ; // June 12, 1895 at 1:55 p.m. (in Norway)<br/>
$dto_now = date_create(@$ts) ;<br/><br/>
If we leave it blank we get current date/time, and the server's timezone:<br/>
$dto_now = date_create(); <br/><br/>
Or we can specify, date/time and timezone<br/><br/>
strtotime("11/22/2018 01:16:14 AM"); returns: <strong><?php echo strtotime("11/22/2018 01:16:14 AM");?></strong><br/><br/>
<h2>PHP DateTime Object / Formatting</h2>
To make the DateTime object human-readable, we need to give it a format.<br/>
There are many predefined formats, or you can build your own.<br/><br/>
Let's Create a DateTime
Create a DateTime variable:<br/><br/>
<?php
echo "Using PHP: attempting to find Server Time Zone...<br/>";
// date_default_timezone_set();
if (date_default_timezone_get()) {
$_timezone = date_default_timezone_get() ;
echo ' date_default_timezone_get() -- returned: ' . date_default_timezone_get() . '<br/>';
}
if (ini_get('date.timezone')) {
echo " ini_get('date.timezone') -- returned: " . ini_get('date.timezone') . '<br/>';
}
$utc_ztime=timezone_open('UTC');
$utc_ztime=timezone_open('+00:00');
echo 'UTC Timezone = '.timezone_name_get($utc_ztime). '<br/><br/>';
## This gets the current server time:
$getTime = $_SERVER['REQUEST_TIME'] ;
$dtz0 = new DateTimeZone("+000");
$dto_now = new DateTime("@$getTime", $dtz0) ; // convert UNIX timestamp to PHP DateTime
// Note the "@" sign - this drops any time-zone offset.
## OR as a demonstration of EPOCH 1, or some other dates, try any of these...
// $ts = '01-01-1970 00:00:01 +0000' ; // Epoch Value of 1
// $ts = '1980-05-18 08:32 -0700' ; // May 18, 1980 at 8:32 a.m.
// $ts = '06-12-1895 13:55:01 +0100' ; // June 12, 1895 at 1:55 p.m. (in Norway)
// $utc_timez=timezone_open('-7:00');
// $dto_now = date_create(@$ts,$utc_timez) ;
// $dto_now = date_create('', $utc_timez) ;
// $dto_now = date_create(@$ts) ;
$dto_now = date_create() ;
?>
$_timezone = date_default_timezone_get() ; // Returns current Server Time Zone
Result: <?php echo chr(36)."_timezone = <strong>".$_timezone."</strong><br/>";?>
$dto_now = date_create("now", timezone_open($_timezone)) ;
<h2>Formatting DateTime...</h2>
The Formatting is defined using certain presets, either for a whole date or for DateTime elements.<br/><br/>
Here are several ways to get the same result:<br/><br/>
$dto_now->format(\DateTime::RFC3339); Returns:<br/>
<?php echo $dto_now->format(\DateTime::RFC3339); ?><br/><br/>
date(DATE_RFC3339); Returns:<br/>
<?php echo date(DATE_RFC3339); ?><br/><br/>
date(DATE_ATOM); Returns:<br/>
<?php echo date(DATE_ATOM); ?><br/>
<tab></tab> //That's DATE_ATOM as the ATOM specification for RSS feed Date-Time format<br/><br/><br/>
<h3>Now we can format our DateTime for display however we like: </h3><br/><br/>
<table>
<tr>
<th>Key </th>
<th>To Get______________________</th>
<th>Format______________________</th>
<th>Returns:____________________</th>
</tr>
<tr></tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> r </td>
<td>Date-time (RFC 2822)</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'r')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'r'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> c </td>
<td>Date-time (ISO 8601)</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'c')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'c'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> O </td>
<td>Date-time (GMT offset)</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'O')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'O'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> P </td>
<td>Date-time (offset hours:minutes)</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'P')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'P'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> U </td>
<td>Date-time Unix Epoch</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'U')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'U'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> e </td>
<td>timezone identifier</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'e')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'e'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> T </td>
<td>Time Zone in 3</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'T')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'T'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> I </td>
<td>Daylight Savings?</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'I')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'I'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> L </td>
<td>Is it a Leap-Year?</td>
<td>date_format($dto_now,'L')</td>
<td><?php echo date_format($dto_now,'L'); ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> - </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>--Mix & Match:</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> M/d/Y </td>
<td>Date (Month/Day/Year)</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('M/d/Y')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('M/d/Y') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> d-m-Y </td>
<td>Date (Day-Month-Year)</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('d-m-Y')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('d-m-Y') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> y-m-d </td>
<td>Date (Year-Month-Date)</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('y-m-d')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('y-m-d') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> Y-m-d H:i </td>
<td>Date and Time</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('Y-m-d H:i')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('Y-m-d H:i') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> - </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>--Each Part:</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> Y </td>
<td>4 digit Year</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('Y')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('Y') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> y </td>
<td>2 digit Year</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('y')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('y') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> F </td>
<td>Month-Full Name</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('F')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('M') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> M </td>
<td>Month-3 Letters</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('M')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('M') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> m </td>
<td>Month-Number 01-12</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('m')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('m') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> n </td>
<td>Month-Number 1-12</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('n')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('n') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> l </td>
<td>Day-of-Week</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('l')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('l') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> D </td>
<td>Day-of-Week in 3</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('D')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('D') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> w </td>
<td>day 0=Sunday, 6=Saturday</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('w')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('w') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> z </td>
<td>day of year 0-366</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('z')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('z') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> d </td>
<td>day number 01-31</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('d')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('d') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> j </td>
<td>day number 1-31</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('j')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('j') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> H </td>
<td>Hour - 24</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('H')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('H') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> h </td>
<td>hour - 12</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('h')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('h') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> A </td>
<td>AM PM</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('A')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('A') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> a </td>
<td>am pm</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('a')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('a') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> i </td>
<td>Minute</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('i')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('i') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> s </td>
<td>Second</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('s')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('s') ; ?></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class="center"> u </td>
<td>Microsecond</td>
<td>$dto_now->format('u')</td>
<td><?php echo $dto_now->format('u') ; ?></td>
</tr>
</table>
<br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/>
</body>
</html>
Here is an iFrame running the DateTime_Demo.php file from this server
If you run the PHP on your server you will get something like this: