--Howdy:
-- // This is mostly for archives sake just in case I forget how //
-- // I did this //
--To recap, the purpose of this exercise was to create a few date variables
to use
--in an SQL script. I wanted the dates to have a 3 months span every time
--I run the script (which would be once a month) so I wouldn't have to
--change the date in the SQL script each time.
--A few problems:
* Create an anchor date to be the first day of the month; this represents
the month the script is executed (e.g., if today is 11/12/2002, the anchor
date is 11/01/2002)
* Calculate spans that crossed new (multiple) year(s). (e.g., if i wanted
spans from 3 years ago
up to the middle of next year)
* Calculate month UP TO the last day of the third month
* Get four digit year
--So ... this is what I came up with. Seems to work, but I'm going to test
--it in the SQL script now.
[begin perl script]
!/usr/bin/perl -w
# created 8 nov 02 - X
# looks like we have a winner ... now test on NT platform
# 12 nov 02 -X
use strict;
use Date::Manip;
## get first of this month as anchor ##
my $day_now=(localtime())[3];
my $firstday=$day_now - ($day_now-1);
my $month_now=(localtime())[4]+1;
my $year_now=(localtime())[5];
my $new_year_now=$year_now + 1900;
## now define whole value ##
# my $full_date = "$month_now/$day_now/$new_year_now";
my $full_date = "$month_now/$firstday/$new_year_now";
## try to put it in to be parsed ##
# my $date = ParseDate("today");
my $date = ParseDate($full_date);
print "today is (in epoch-speak): ", $date, "\n\n";
##
my $startdate = DateCalc($date, "-4 months");
#my $enddate = DateCalc($startdate, "+23 months");
# *evil lol* ... didn't think this would work ... go fig ...
my $enddate = DateCalc($startdate, "+3 months - 1 day");
print "start date 4 months ago is (in epoch-speak) ", $startdate, "\n";
print "end date 3 month span is (in epoch-speak)", $enddate, "\n\n";
my $newnow = UnixDate($date, "%m/%d/%Y");
my $newstart = UnixDate($startdate,"%m/%d/%Y");
my $newend = UnixDate($enddate,"%m/%d/%Y");
print "today (in english-speak) is: ", $newnow, "\n\n";
print "new start date (in english-speak) is 4 months ago: ", $newstart,
"\n\n";
print "new end date (in english-speak) is: \n";
print "3 months (to last day of month) since new start date ", $newend,
"\n\n";
__END__
[end perl script]
--Yes, I know that this is probably the ugliest code you've ever seen ...
when
--I get more experienced with perl, I'll clean it up (or, learn a new
technique or three).
--Thanks all!
-X
