curl_getdate

curl_getdate(3)			libcurl Manual		      curl_getdate(3)



NAME
       curl_getdate  - Convert an date in a ASCII string to number of seconds
       since January 1, 1970

SYNOPSIS
       #include <curl/curl.h>

       time_t curl_getdate(char *datestring, time_t *now");

DESCRIPTION
       This function returns the number of seconds since  January  1st	1970,
       for the date and time that the datestring parameter specifies. The now
       parameter is there and should hold the current time to allow the	 dat-
       estring	to  specify  relative  dates/times.  Read further in the date
       string parser section below.

PARSING DATES AND TIMES
       A "date" is a string, possibly empty, containing many items  separated
       by  whitespace.	 The  whitespace  may  be  omitted  when no ambiguity
       arises.	The empty string means the beginning  of  today	 (i.e.,	 mid-
       night).	 Order of the items is immaterial.  A date string may contain
       many flavors of items:

       calendar date items
	       This can be specified in a number of different ways. Including
	       1970-09-17,  70-9-17, 70-09-17, 9/17/72, 24 September 1972, 24
	       Sept 72, 24 Sep 72, Sep 24,  1972,  24-sep-72,  24sep72.	  The
	       year can also be omitted, for example: 9/17 or "sep 17".

       time of the day items
	       This  string  specifies	the  time on a given day. Syntax sup-
	       ported includes: 18:19:0, 18:19, 6:19pm, 18:19-0500 (for spec-
	       ifying the time zone as well).

       time zone items
	       Specifies  international	 time  zone. There are a few acronyms
	       supported, but in general you should instead use the  specific
	       relative	 time  compared	 to  UTC.  Supported formats include:
	       -1200, MST, +0100.

       day of the week items
	       Specifies a day of the week. If this  is	 mentioned  alone  it
	       means that day of the week in the future.

	       Days  of	 the week may be spelled out in full: ‘Sunday’, ‘Mon-
	       day’, etc or they may be abbreviated to their first three let-
	       ters,  optionally followed by a period.	The special abbrevia-
	       tions ‘Tues’  for  ‘Tuesday’,  ‘Wednes’	for  ‘Wednesday’  and
	       ‘Thur’ or ‘Thurs’ for ‘Thursday’ are also allowed.

	       A  number  may  precede a day of the week item to move forward
	       supplementary weeks.  It	 is  best  used	 in  expression	 like
	       ‘third  monday’.	 In this context, ‘last DAY’ or ‘next DAY’ is
	       also acceptable; they move one week before or  after  the  day
	       that DAY by itself would represent.

       relative items
	       A  relative  item adjusts a date (or the current date if none)
	       forward or backward. Example syntax  includes:  "1  year",  "1
	       year ago", "2 days", "4 weeks".

	       The   string  ‘tomorrow’	 is  worth  one	 day  in  the  future
	       (equivalent to ‘day’), the string ‘yesterday’ is worth one day
	       in the past (equivalent to ‘day ago’).

       pure numbers
	       If  the	decimal	 number	 is of the form YYYYMMDD and no other
	       calendar date item appears before it in the date string,	 then
	       YYYY is read as the year, MM as the month number and DD as the
	       day of the month, for the specified calendar date.


RETURN VALUE
       This function returns zero when it fails to  parse  the	date  string.
       Otherwise it returns the number of seconds as described.

AUTHORS
       Originally  written by Steven M. Bellovin <smb@research.att.com> while
       at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  Later tweaked  by
       a  couple  of  people  on  Usenet.  Completely overhauled by Rich $alz
       <rsalz@bbn.com> and Jim Berets <jberets@bbn.com> in August, 1990.

       It has been modified extensively since imported to curl.

SEE ALSO
       GNUdate(1)



libcurl 7.0			 5 March 2001		      curl_getdate(3)