MTB Statements

DATE2NUM function

Syntax:	DATE2NUM(date-string,date-mode)
Discussion:	The DATE2NUM function converts a date-string to a 6-digit date serial number. DATE2NUM performs the following steps before converting the date-string: Adds leading zeroes to the month and day components of the date-string, if necessary Searches for and removes all non-numeric characters from the date-string, if necessary (for example, removes the "/" symbols between month, day, and year) Applies the sliding year logic to the date-string, if necessary (see below) For example, a date-string of "5/1/98" would be converted to "05011998" and then converted to the corresponding date serial number. The date-mode is a 1-digit numeric variable that serves two purposes: Prior to the date-to-number conversion, date-mode must be set to a value that indicates the format of the date-string (after the above preparatory conversion steps have been performed). The following chart shows the accepted date-mode values: Date-mode Date-string Date-string format Value format (with sliding year logic) =================================================== 0 MMDDYYYY MMDDYY 1 DDMMYYYY DDMMYY 2 YYYYMMDD YYMMDD 3 YYYYDDMM YYDDMM After the date-to-number conversion, date-mode returns a value that indicates whether the conversion was sucesssful or not. The DATE2NUM function validates calendar dates (e.g., 12 months in a year, valid number of days per month). It also makes sure that the date falls within the allowed limits (see below). If the date-string is a valid date, the date-mode equals 0, otherwise it equals 1. DATE2NUM returns a date serial number that represents the number of days elapsed from a given base date. The base date is January 1, 1800. The greatest date covered by this function is December 31, 2299. The following chart demonstrates these values. Date Date string Date serial number ------------------------------------------------------ January 1, 1800 "01011800" 0 December 31, 2299 "12312299" 182620 The DATETONUM function respects the rules for leap years (i.e., the years 1800 and 1900 were not leap years, but the year 2000 is a leap year). The NUM2DATE function converts a date serial numer to a date string. Also see DATETONUM and NUMTODATE.
Sliding year logic:	If the date-string contains a 2-byte year (e.g., "98"), rather than a full 4-byte year (e.g., "1998"), Comet applies the following sliding year logic: If YY is greater than or equal to the sliding year value (from the system configuration file), the number returned by DATE2NUM uses the sliding century value (it adds this to the YY value). Thus, using the default value, MMDDYY assumes the century to be 1900. If YY is less than the sliding year value, the number returned by DATE2NUM is the sliding century plus 100 years. For current CFIG files, the default values (1900 and 40) are assumed.
Application note:	The DATE2NUM function can simplify the date computation algorithms in your MTB programs. For example, to compute the number of days between two dates, you simply convert both dates to their equivalent date serial numbers, then subtract one value from the other.
History:	This function was added in Comet version 504.233 and Comet98 Build 233.
Example:	LENGTH 12 & LOCAL DATESTING$ LENGTH 1.0 & LOCAL DATEMODE LENGTH 6.0 & LOCAL SERIAL . . . PRINT (0) "Enter a date string:" INPUT (0) DATESTRING$ PRINT (0) "Enter a date mode (0-3):" INPUT (0) DATEMODE SERIAL = DATE2NUM(DATESTRING$, DATEMODE) PRINT (0) "The date serial number is:" ; SERIAL PRINT (0) "The error argument is:" ; DATEMODE The following table shows how various input values would be converted by the above program: Input: Results: DATESTRING$ DATEMODE SERIAL DATEMODE ============================================= "7/4/98" 0 72502 0 "7/4/1998" 0 72502 0 "070498" 0 72502 0 "07041998" 0 72502 0 "04071998" 1 72502 0 "19980704" 2 72502 0 "19980407" 3 72502 0 "7/4/01" 0 73598 0 "7/4/2001" 0 73598 0 "070401" 0 73598 0 "07042001" 0 73598 0 "123456" 0 0 1