View source for $Web Date, $Web DateND, $Web DateNM, and $Web DateNS

{{DISPLAYTITLE:$Web_Date, $Web_DateND, $Web_DateNM, and $Web_DateNS}}
<span class="pageSubtitle">$Web_DateND, $Web_DateNM, and $Web_DateNS: Current date as number</span>


The $Web_Date* functions get the current date and time as a number. The returned number is always in time units since 12 AM on Jan 1, 1900.

==Syntax==
<p class="syntax">%DATETIME = $Web_Date
%DATETIME = $Web_DateND
%DATETIME = $Web_DateNM
%DATETIME = $Web_DateNS
</p>

==Usage notes==
<ul>
<li>Each of the $Web_Date* functions takes no arguments and returns a number. The time units returned by the various flavors of $Web_Date* are :
<table class="syntaxTable">
<tr><th>$Web_Date</th>
<td>Number of seconds since midnight, January 1, 1900.</td></tr>
<tr><th>$Web_DateND</th>
<td>Number of days since midnight, January 1, 1900.</td></tr>
<tr><th>$Wdb_DateNM</th>
<td>Number of milliseconds since midnight, January 1, 1900.</td></tr>
<tr><th>$Web_DateNS</th>
<td>Number of seconds since midnight, January 1, 1900.
</td></tr></table>

<li><var>$Web_Date</var> produces identical results to <var>$Web_DateNS</var>. For clarity, it is recommended that <var>$Web_DateNS</var> be used instead of <var>$Web_Date</var>, since <var>$Web_DateNS</var> indicates the time units being returned (number of seconds). 

<li>The units returned by the $Web_Date* functions are convenient to manipulate because there are no idiosyncrasies of date/time formats to deal with and can be useful as inputs to other web $functions or as time stamps.
For example, this sets an expiration time for the current URL of 24 hours hence:
<p class="code">%rc = $Web_Expire($Web_DateNS + 24 * 60 * 60)
</p>
The following sets a timestamp in a record to the current time in milliseconds. 
<p class="code">%WEBDATENM = $Web_DateNM
CHANGE TIMESTAMP TO %WEBDATENM
</p>

<li>In general, <var>$Web_DateNS</var> is the preferred <var>$Web_Date</var> function because its time units match the resolution of web timestamps such a those used in <var>[[$Web_Expire]]</var> and <var>[[$Web_Last_Modified]]</var> processing. While it might be tempting to use the very high resolution provided by <var>$Web_Date2NM</var>, this resolution would be lost if used in expiration or last-modified processing and could be the source of application bugs.
</ul>

==See also==
<ul>

<li><var>[[$Web_Date2D, $Web_Date2N, $Web_Date2ND, $Web_Date2NM, $Web_Date2NS]]</var> 
<li><var>[[$Web_D2Date, $Web_N2Date, $Web_ND2Date, $Web_NM2Date, $Web_NS2Date]]</var>
</ul>


[[Category:Janus Web Server $functions|$Web_Date, $Web_DateND, $Web_DateNM, and $Web_DateNS]]