DateTime::Format::Flexible - DateTime::Format::Flexible - Flexibly parse strings and turn them into DateTime objects.

  use DateTime::Format::Flexible;
  my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime( 'January 8, 1999' );
  # $dt = a DateTime object set at 1999-01-08T00:00:00

If you have ever had to use a program that made you type in the date a certain way and thought "Why can't the computer just figure out what date I wanted?", this module is for you.

DateTime::Format::Flexible attempts to take any string you give it and parse it into a DateTime object.

This module uses DateTime::Format::Builder under the covers.

Give it a string and it attempts to parse it and return a DateTime object.

If it cannot it will throw an exception.

 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime( $date );

 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime(
     $date,
     strip    => [qr{\.\z}],                  # optional, remove a trailing period
     tz_map   => {EDT => 'America/New_York'}, # optional, map the EDT timezone to America/New_York
     lang     => ['es'],                      # optional, only parse using spanish
     european => 1                            # optional, catch some cases of DD-MM-YY
 );

* base (optional)

Does the same thing as the method base. Sets a base datetime for incomplete dates. Requires a valid DateTime object as an argument.

example:

 my $base_dt = DateTime->new( year => 2005, month => 2, day => 1 );
 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime(
    '18 Mar',
     base => $base_dt
 );
 # $dt is now 2005-03-18T00:00:00

* strip (optional)

Remove a substring from the string you are trying to parse. You can pass multiple regexes in an arrayref.

example:

 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime(
     '2011-04-26 00:00:00 (registry time)' ,
     strip => [qr{\(registry time\)\z}] ,
 );
 # $dt is now 2011-04-26T00:00:00

This is helpful if you have a load of dates you want to normalize and you know of some weird formatting beforehand.

* tz_map (optional)

map a given timezone to another recognized timezone Values are given as a hashref.

example:

 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime(
     '25-Jun-2009 EDT' ,
     tz_map => {EDT => 'America/New_York'}
 );
 # $dt is now 2009-06-25T00:00:00 with a timezone of America/New_York

This is helpful if you have a load of dates that have timezones that are not recognized by DateTime::Timezone.

* lang (optional)

Specify the language map plugins to use.

When DateTime::Format::Flexible parses a date with a string in it, it will search for a way to convert that string to a number. By default it will search through all the language plugins to search for a match.

Setting this lets you limit the scope of the search

example:

 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime(
     'Wed, Jun 10, 2009' ,
     lang => ['en']
 );
 # $dt is now 2009-06-10T00:00:00

Currently supported languages are english (en) and spanish (es). Contributions, corrections, requests and examples are VERY welcome. See the DateTime::Format::Flexible::lang::en and DateTime::Dormat::Flexible::lang::es for examples of the plugins.

* european (optional)

If european is set to a true value, an attempt will be made to parse as a DD-MM-YYYY date instead of the default MM-DD-YYYY. There is a chance that this will not do the right thing due to ambiguity.

example:

 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime(
     '16/06/2010' , european => 1 ,
 );
 # $dt is now 2010-06-16T00:00:00

gets/sets the base DateTime for incomplete dates. Requires a valid DateTime object as an argument when setting.

example:

 DateTime::Format::Flexible->base( DateTime->new( year => 2009, month => 6, day => 22 ) );
 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime( '23:59' );
 # $dt is now 2009-06-22T23:59:00

an alias for parse_datetime

A small list of supported formats:

YYYYMMDDTHHMMSS

YYYYMMDDTHHMM

YYYYMMDDTHH

YYYYMMDD

YYYYMM

MM-DD-YYYY

MM-D-YYYY

MM-DD-YY

M-DD-YY

YYYY/DD/MM

YYYY/M/DD

YYYY/MM/D

M-D

MM-D

M-D-Y

Month D, YYYY

Mon D, YYYY

Mon D, YYYY HH:MM:SS

...

there are 9000+ variations that are detected correctly in the test files (see t/data/* for most of them). If you can think of any that I do not cover, please let me know.

As of version 0.11 you will get a DateTime::Infinite::Future object if the passed in date is 'infinity' and a DateTime::Infinite::Past object if the passed in date is '-infinity'. If you are expecting these types of strings, you might want to check for 'is_infinite()' from the object returned.

example:

 my $dt = DateTime::Format::Flexible->parse_datetime( 'infinity' );
 if ( $dt->is_infinite )
 {
      # you have a Infinite object.
 }

The DateTime website http://datetime.perl.org/?Modules as of february 2010 lists this module under 'Confusing' and recommends the use of DateTime::Format::Natural.

Unfortunately I do not agree. DateTime::Format::Natural fails more than 2000 of my parsing tests. DateTime::Format::Flexible supports different types of date/time strings than DateTime::Format::Natural. I think there is utility in that can be found in both of them.

The whole goal of DateTime::Format::Flexible is to accept just about any crazy date/time string that a user might care to enter. DateTime::Format::Natural seems to be a little stricter in what it can parse.

You cannot use a 1 or 2 digit year as the first field unless the year is > 31:

 YY-MM-DD # not supported if YY is <= 31
 Y-MM-DD  # not supported

It gets confused with MM-DD-YY

Tom Heady <cpan@punch.net>

Copyright 2007-2011 Tom Heady.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of either:

* the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 1, or (at your option) any later version, or

* the Artistic License version 2.0.

DateTime::Format::Builder, DateTime::Timezone, DateTime::Format::Natural