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<title>Returns new DateTime object formatted according to the specified format</title>
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<h1 class="refname">DateTime::createFromFormat</h1>
<h1 class="refname">date_create_from_format</h1>
<p class="verinfo">(PHP 5 >= 5.3.0)</p><p class="refpurpose"><span class="refname">DateTime::createFromFormat</span> -- <span class="refname">date_create_from_format</span> — <span class="dc-title">Returns new DateTime object formatted according to the specified format</span></p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 description" id="refsect1-datetime.createfromformat-description">
<h3 class="title">Description</h3>
<p class="para">Object oriented style</p>
<div class="methodsynopsis dc-description">
<span class="modifier">public</span> <span class="modifier">static</span> <span class="type"><a href="class.datetime.html" class="type DateTime">DateTime</a></span> <span class="methodname"><strong>DateTime::createFromFormat</strong></span>
( <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">string</span> <code class="parameter">$format</code></span>
, <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">string</span> <code class="parameter">$time</code></span>
[, <span class="methodparam"><span class="type"><a href="class.datetimezone.html" class="type DateTimeZone">DateTimeZone</a></span> <code class="parameter">$timezone</code></span>
] )</div>
<p class="para rdfs-comment">Procedural style</p>
<div class="methodsynopsis dc-description">
<span class="type"><a href="class.datetime.html" class="type DateTime">DateTime</a></span> <span class="methodname"><a href="function.date-create-from-format.html" class="methodname">date_create_from_format</a></span>
( <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">string</span> <code class="parameter">$format</code></span>
, <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">string</span> <code class="parameter">$time</code></span>
[, <span class="methodparam"><span class="type"><a href="class.datetimezone.html" class="type DateTimeZone">DateTimeZone</a></span> <code class="parameter">$timezone</code></span>
] )</div>
<p class="para rdfs-comment">
Returns new DateTime object formatted according to the specified format.
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 parameters" id="refsect1-datetime.createfromformat-parameters">
<h3 class="title">Parameters</h3>
<dl>
<dt>
<span class="term"><em><code class="parameter">format</code></em></span>
<dd>
<p class="para">
The format that the passed in <span class="type"><a href="language.types.string.html" class="type string">string</a></span> should be in. See the
formatting options below. In most cases, the same letters as for the
<span class="function"><a href="function.date.html" class="function">date()</a></span> can be used.
</p>
<p class="para">
<table class="doctable table">
<caption><strong>The following characters are recognized in the
<em><code class="parameter">format</code></em> parameter string</strong></caption>
<thead>
<tr>
<th><em><code class="parameter">format</code></em> character</th>
<th>Description</th>
<th>Example parsable values</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody class="tbody">
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;"><em class="emphasis">Day</em></td>
<td>---</td>
<td>---</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>d</em> and <em>j</em></td>
<td>Day of the month, 2 digits with or without leading zeros</td>
<td>
<em>01</em> to <em>31</em> or
<em>1</em> to <em>31</em>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>D</em> and <em>l</em></td>
<td>A textual representation of a day</td>
<td>
<em>Mon</em> through <em>Sun</em> or
<em>Sunday</em> through <em>Saturday</em>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>S</em></td>
<td>English ordinal suffix for the day of the month, 2
characters. It's ignored while processing.</td>
<td>
<em>st</em>, <em>nd</em>, <em>rd</em> or
<em>th</em>.
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>z</em></td>
<td>The day of the year (starting from 0)</td>
<td><em>0</em> through <em>365</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;"><em class="emphasis">Month</em></td>
<td>---</td>
<td>---</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>F</em> and <em>M</em></td>
<td>A textual representation of a month, such as January or Sept</td>
<td>
<em>January</em> through <em>December</em> or
<em>Jan</em> through <em>Dec</em>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>m</em> and <em>n</em></td>
<td>Numeric representation of a month, with or without leading zeros</td>
<td>
<em>01</em> through <em>12</em> or
<em>1</em> through <em>12</em>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;"><em class="emphasis">Year</em></td>
<td>---</td>
<td>---</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>Y</em></td>
<td>A full numeric representation of a year, 4 digits</td>
<td>Examples: <em>1999</em> or <em>2003</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>y</em></td>
<td>A two digit representation of a year</td>
<td>Examples: <em>99</em> or <em>03</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;"><em class="emphasis">Time</em></td>
<td>---</td>
<td>---</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>a</em> and <em>A</em></td>
<td>Ante meridiem and Post meridiem</td>
<td><em>am</em> or <em>pm</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>g</em> and <em>h</em></td>
<td>12-hour format of an hour with or without leading zero</td>
<td>
<em>1</em> through <em>12</em> or
<em>01</em> through <em>12</em>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>G</em> and <em>H</em></td>
<td>24-hour format of an hour with or without leading zeros</td>
<td>
<em>0</em> through <em>23</em> or
<em>00</em> through <em>23</em>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>i</em></td>
<td>Minutes with leading zeros</td>
<td><em>00</em> to <em>59</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>s</em></td>
<td>Seconds, with leading zeros</td>
<td><em>00</em> through <em>59</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>u</em></td>
<td>Microseconds (up to six digits)</td>
<td>Example: <em>45</em>, <em>654321</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;"><em class="emphasis">Timezone</em></td>
<td>---</td>
<td>---</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<em>e</em>, <em>O</em>,
<em>P</em> and <em>T</em>
</td>
<td>Timezone identifier, or difference to UTC in hours, or
difference to UTC with colon between hours and minutes, or timezone
abbreviation</td>
<td>Examples: <em>UTC</em>, <em>GMT</em>,
<em>Atlantic/Azores</em> or
<em>+0200</em> or <em>+02:00</em> or
<em>EST</em>, <em>MDT</em>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;"><em class="emphasis">Full Date/Time</em></td>
<td>---</td>
<td>---</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>U</em></td>
<td>Seconds since the Unix Epoch (January 1 1970 00:00:00 GMT)</td>
<td>Example: <em>1292177455</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: center;"><em class="emphasis">Whitespace and Separators</em></td>
<td>---</td>
<td>---</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em> </em> (space)</td>
<td>One space or one tab</td>
<td>Example: <em> </em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>#</em></td>
<td>
One of the following separation symbol: <em>;</em>,
<em>:</em>, <em>/</em>, <em>.</em>,
<em>,</em>, <em>-</em>, <em>(</em> or
<em>)</em>
</td>
<td>Example: <em>/</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<em>;</em>,
<em>:</em>, <em>/</em>, <em>.</em>,
<em>,</em>, <em>-</em>, <em>(</em> or
<em>)</em>
</td>
<td>The specified character.</td>
<td>Example: <em>-</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>?</em></td>
<td>A random byte</td>
<td>Example: <em>^</em> (Be aware that for UTF-8
characracters you might need more than one <em>?</em>.
In this case, using <em>*</em> is probably what you want
instead)</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>*</em></td>
<td>Random bytes until the next separator or digit</td>
<td>Example: <em>*</em> in <em>Y-*-d</em> with
the string <em>2009-aWord-08</em> will match
<em>aWord</em></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>!</em></td>
<td>Resets all fields (year, month, day, hour, minute, second,
fraction and timzone information) to the Unix Epoch</td>
<td>Without <em>!,</em> all fields will be set to the
current date and time.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>|</em></td>
<td>Resets all fields (year, month, day, hour, minute, second,
fraction and timzone information) to the Unix Epoch if they have
not been parsed yet</td>
<td><em>Y-m-d|</em> will set the year, month and day
to the information found in the string to parse, and sets the hour,
minute and second to 0.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><em>+</em></td>
<td>If this format specifier is present, trailing data in the
string will not cause an error, but a warning instead</td>
<td>Use <span class="methodname"><a href="datetime.getlasterrors.html" class="methodname">DateTime::getLastErrors()</a></span> to find out
whether trailing data was present.</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</p>
<p class="para">
Unrecognized characters in the format string will cause the
parsing to fail and an error message is appended to the returned
structure. You can query error messages with
<span class="methodname"><a href="datetime.getlasterrors.html" class="methodname">DateTime::getLastErrors()</a></span>.
</p>
<p class="para">
If <em><code class="parameter">format</code></em> does not contain the character
<em>!</em> then portions of the generated time which are not
specified in <em><code class="parameter">format</code></em> will be set to the current
system time.
</p>
<p class="para">
If <em><code class="parameter">format</code></em> contains the
character <em>!</em>, then portions of the generated
time not provided in <em><code class="parameter">format</code></em>, as well as
values to the left-hand side of the <em>!</em>, will
be set to corresponding values from the Unix epoch.
</p>
<p class="para">
The Unix epoch is 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC.
</p>
</dd>
</dt>
<dt>
<span class="term"><em><code class="parameter">time</code></em></span>
<dd>
<p class="para">
String representing the time.
</p>
</dd>
</dt>
<dt>
<span class="term"><em><code class="parameter">timezone</code></em></span>
<dd>
<p class="para">
A <a href="class.datetimezone.html" class="classname">DateTimeZone</a> object representing the
desired time zone.
</p>
<p class="para">
If <em><code class="parameter">timezone</code></em> is omitted and
<em><code class="parameter">time</code></em> contains no timezone,
the current timezone will be used.
</p>
<blockquote class="note"><p><strong class="note">Note</strong>:
<p class="para">
The <em><code class="parameter">timezone</code></em> parameter
and the current timezone are ignored when the
<em><code class="parameter">time</code></em> parameter either
contains a UNIX timestamp (e.g. <em>946684800</em>)
or specifies a timezone
(e.g. <em>2010-01-28T15:00:00+02:00</em>).
</p>
</p></blockquote>
</dd>
</dt>
</dl>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 returnvalues" id="refsect1-datetime.createfromformat-returnvalues">
<h3 class="title">Return Values</h3>
<p class="para">
Returns a new DateTime instance or <strong><code>FALSE</code></strong> on failure.
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 examples" id="refsect1-datetime.createfromformat-examples">
<h3 class="title">Examples</h3>
<div class="example" id="example-2255">
<p><strong>Example #1 <span class="function"><strong>DateTime::createFromFormat()</strong></span> example</strong></p>
<div class="example-contents"><p>Object oriented style</p></div>
<div class="example-contents">
<div class="phpcode"><code><span style="color: #000000">
<span style="color: #0000BB"><?php<br />$date </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">DateTime</span><span style="color: #007700">::</span><span style="color: #0000BB">createFromFormat</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'j-M-Y'</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'15-Feb-2009'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />echo </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #007700">-></span><span style="color: #0000BB">format</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">?></span>
</span>
</code></div>
</div>
<div class="example-contents"><p>Procedural style</p></div>
<div class="example-contents">
<div class="phpcode"><code><span style="color: #000000">
<span style="color: #0000BB"><?php<br />$date </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">date_create_from_format</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'j-M-Y'</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'15-Feb-2009'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />echo </span><span style="color: #0000BB">date_format</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">?></span>
</span>
</code></div>
</div>
<div class="example-contents"><p>The above examples will output:</p></div>
<div class="example-contents screen">
<div class="cdata"><pre>
2009-02-15
</pre></div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="example" id="example-2256">
<p><strong>Example #2 Intricacies of <span class="function"><strong>DateTime::createFromFormat()</strong></span></strong></p>
<div class="example-contents">
<div class="phpcode"><code><span style="color: #000000">
<span style="color: #0000BB"><?php<br /></span><span style="color: #007700">echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Current time: ' </span><span style="color: #007700">. </span><span style="color: #0000BB">date</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d H:i:s'</span><span style="color: #007700">) . </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"\n"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /><br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d'</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">DateTime</span><span style="color: #007700">::</span><span style="color: #0000BB">createFromFormat</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'2009-02-15'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"Format: </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #DD0000">; " </span><span style="color: #007700">. </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #007700">-></span><span style="color: #0000BB">format</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d H:i:s'</span><span style="color: #007700">) . </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"\n"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /><br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d H:i:s'</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">DateTime</span><span style="color: #007700">::</span><span style="color: #0000BB">createFromFormat</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'2009-02-15 15:16:17'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"Format: </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #DD0000">; " </span><span style="color: #007700">. </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #007700">-></span><span style="color: #0000BB">format</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d H:i:s'</span><span style="color: #007700">) . </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"\n"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /><br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-!d H:i:s'</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">DateTime</span><span style="color: #007700">::</span><span style="color: #0000BB">createFromFormat</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'2009-02-15 15:16:17'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"Format: </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #DD0000">; " </span><span style="color: #007700">. </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #007700">-></span><span style="color: #0000BB">format</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d H:i:s'</span><span style="color: #007700">) . </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"\n"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /><br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'!d'</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">DateTime</span><span style="color: #007700">::</span><span style="color: #0000BB">createFromFormat</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #DD0000">'15'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"Format: </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$format</span><span style="color: #DD0000">; " </span><span style="color: #007700">. </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #007700">-></span><span style="color: #0000BB">format</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'Y-m-d H:i:s'</span><span style="color: #007700">) . </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"\n"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">?></span>
</span>
</code></div>
</div>
<div class="example-contents"><p>The above example will output
something similar to:</p></div>
<div class="example-contents screen">
<div class="cdata"><pre>
Current time: 2010-04-23 10:29:35
Format: Y-m-d; 2009-02-15 10:29:35
Format: Y-m-d H:i:s; 2009-02-15 15:16:17
Format: Y-m-!d H:i:s; 1970-01-15 15:16:17
Format: !d; 1970-01-15 00:00:00
</pre></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 seealso" id="refsect1-datetime.createfromformat-seealso">
<h3 class="title">See Also</h3>
<ul class="simplelist">
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="datetime.construct.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">DateTime::__construct()</a> - Returns new DateTime object</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="datetime.getlasterrors.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">DateTime::getLastErrors()</a> - Returns the warnings and errors</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.checkdate.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">checkdate()</a> - Validate a Gregorian date</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.strptime.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">strptime()</a> - Parse a time/date generated with strftime</span></li>
</ul>
</div>
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