$Web_Date, $Web_DateND, $Web_DateNM, and $Web_DateNS

$Web_DateND, $Web_DateNM, and $Web_DateNS: Current date as number

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

%DATETIME = $Web_Date %DATETIME = $Web_DateND %DATETIME = $Web_DateNM %DATETIME = $Web_DateNS

Usage notes

• 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 :

  $Web_Date	Number of seconds since midnight, January 1, 1900.
  $Web_DateND	Number of days since midnight, January 1, 1900.
  $Wdb_DateNM	Number of milliseconds since midnight, January 1, 1900.
  $Web_DateNS	Number of seconds since midnight, January 1, 1900.

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

  %rc = $Web_Expire($Web_DateNS + 24 * 60 * 60)

  The following sets a timestamp in a record to the current time in milliseconds.

  %WEBDATENM = $Web_DateNM CHANGE TIMESTAMP TO %WEBDATENM

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

See also

• $Web_Date2D, $Web_Date2N, $Web_Date2ND, $Web_Date2NM, $Web_Date2NS
• $Web_D2Date, $Web_N2Date, $Web_ND2Date, $Web_NM2Date, $Web_NS2Date