Handling dates and times is an essential aspect of many programming tasks.

Python provides robust modules to work with dates and times, making it easier to perform operations like formatting, parsing, and arithmetic.

This guide provides an overview of these modules and their key functionalities.

The datetime module supplies classes for manipulating dates and times. The main classes in the datetime module are:

* date: Represents a date (year, month, day).

* time: Represents a time (hour, minute, second, microsecond).

* datetime: Combines date and time information.

* timedelta: Represents the difference between two dates or times.

* tzinfo: Provides time zone information objects.

**Key Concepts:**

* Naive vs. Aware: Naive datetime objects do not contain time zone information, while aware datetime objects do.

* Immutability: date and time objects are immutable; once created, they cannot be changed.

Example:

import datetime

now = datetime.datetime.now()

print("Current date and time:", now)

Formatting involves converting datetime objects into human-readable strings. This is achieved using the strftime method, which stands for "string format time."

You can specify various format codes to dictate how the output string should be structured.

**Common Format Codes:**

* %Y: Year with century (e.g., 2024)

* %m: Month as a zero-padded decimal number (e.g., 01)

* %d: Day of the month as a zero-padded decimal number (e.g., 15)

* %H: Hour (24-hour clock) as a zero-padded decimal number (e.g., 13)

* %M: Minute as a zero-padded decimal number (e.g., 45)

* %S: Second as a zero-padded decimal number (e.g., 30)

Example:

import datetime

now = datetime.datetime.now()

formatted_now = now.strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")

print("Formatted current date and time:", formatted_now)

Parsing is the process of converting strings representing dates and times into datetime objects. The strptime method, which stands for "string parse time,"

allows you to specify the format of the input string.

Example:

import datetime

date_string = "2024-05-15 13:45:30"

date_object = datetime.datetime.strptime(date_string, "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")

print("Parsed date and time:", date_object)

The timedelta class is used to represent the difference between two datetime objects. This is useful for calculations involving durations, such as finding the

number of days between two dates or adding a certain period to a date.

Example:

import datetime

date1 = datetime.datetime(2024, 5, 15, 12, 0, 0)

date2 = datetime.datetime(2024, 5, 20, 14, 30, 0)

difference = date2 - date1

print("Difference:", difference)

print("Days:", difference.days)

print("Total seconds:", difference.total_seconds())

```bash

import datetime

import pytz

tz = pytz.timezone('Asia/Kolkata')

now = datetime.datetime.now(tz)

print("Current time in Asia/Kolkata:", now)

```bash

import datetime

today = datetime.date.today()

future_date = today + datetime.timedelta(days=10)

print("Date after 10 days:", future_date)

- [Working with Dates & Times in Python](dates_and_times.md)

- [Regular Expressions in Python](regular_expressions.md)

- [JSON module](json-module.md)