Rails Formatting Date
I Am Posting a Date to an Api and the Required Format Is as Follows: 2014-12-01T01:29:18 I Can Get the Date from the Model Like So: Model. Created_At. To_S...
I am posting a date to an API and the required format is as follows:
2014-12-01T01:29:18
I can get the date from the model like so:
Model.created_at.to_s
That returns:
2014-12-01 01:29:18 -0500
How can I use Rails or Ruby to format it like the required format with the T and removing the -0500?
4 Answers
Use
Model.created_at.strftime("%FT%T")
where,
%F - The ISO 8601 date format (%Y-%m-%d)
%T - 24-hour time (%H:%M:%S)
Following are some of the frequently used useful list of Date and Time formats that you could specify in strftime method:
Date (Year, Month, Day):
%Y - Year with century (can be negative, 4 digits at least)
-0001, 0000, 1995, 2009, 14292, etc.
%C - year / 100 (round down. 20 in 2009)
%y - year % 100 (00..99)
%m - Month of the year, zero-padded (01..12)
%_m blank-padded ( 1..12)
%-m no-padded (1..12)
%B - The full month name (``January'')
%^B uppercased (``JANUARY'')
%b - The abbreviated month name (``Jan'')
%^b uppercased (``JAN'')
%h - Equivalent to %b
%d - Day of the month, zero-padded (01..31)
%-d no-padded (1..31)
%e - Day of the month, blank-padded ( 1..31)
%j - Day of the year (001..366)
Time (Hour, Minute, Second, Subsecond):
%H - Hour of the day, 24-hour clock, zero-padded (00..23)
%k - Hour of the day, 24-hour clock, blank-padded ( 0..23)
%I - Hour of the day, 12-hour clock, zero-padded (01..12)
%l - Hour of the day, 12-hour clock, blank-padded ( 1..12)
%P - Meridian indicator, lowercase (``am'' or ``pm'')
%p - Meridian indicator, uppercase (``AM'' or ``PM'')
%M - Minute of the hour (00..59)
%S - Second of the minute (00..59)
%L - Millisecond of the second (000..999)
%N - Fractional seconds digits, default is 9 digits (nanosecond)
%3N millisecond (3 digits)
%6N microsecond (6 digits)
%9N nanosecond (9 digits)
%12N picosecond (12 digits)
For the complete list of formats for strftime method please visit APIDock
Try this:
created_at.strftime('%FT%T')
It's a time formatting function which provides you a way to present the string representation of the date. ().
From APIdock:
%Y%m%d => 20071119 Calendar date (basic)
%F => 2007-11-19 Calendar date (extended)
%Y-%m => 2007-11 Calendar date, reduced accuracy, specific month
%Y => 2007 Calendar date, reduced accuracy, specific year
%C => 20 Calendar date, reduced accuracy, specific century
%Y%j => 2007323 Ordinal date (basic)
%Y-%j => 2007-323 Ordinal date (extended)
%GW%V%u => 2007W471 Week date (basic)
%G-W%V-%u => 2007-W47-1 Week date (extended)
%GW%V => 2007W47 Week date, reduced accuracy, specific week (basic)
%G-W%V => 2007-W47 Week date, reduced accuracy, specific week (extended)
%H%M%S => 083748 Local time (basic)
%T => 08:37:48 Local time (extended)
%H%M => 0837 Local time, reduced accuracy, specific minute (basic)
%H:%M => 08:37 Local time, reduced accuracy, specific minute (extended)
%H => 08 Local time, reduced accuracy, specific hour
%H%M%S,%L => 083748,000 Local time with decimal fraction, comma as decimal sign (basic)
%T,%L => 08:37:48,000 Local time with decimal fraction, comma as decimal sign (extended)
%H%M%S.%L => 083748.000 Local time with decimal fraction, full stop as decimal sign (basic)
%T.%L => 08:37:48.000 Local time with decimal fraction, full stop as decimal sign (extended)
%H%M%S%z => 083748-0600 Local time and the difference from UTC (basic)
%T%:z => 08:37:48-06:00 Local time and the difference from UTC (extended)
%Y%m%dT%H%M%S%z => 20071119T083748-0600 Date and time of day for calendar date (basic)
%FT%T%:z => 2007-11-19T08:37:48-06:00 Date and time of day for calendar date (extended)
%Y%jT%H%M%S%z => 2007323T083748-0600 Date and time of day for ordinal date (basic)
%Y-%jT%T%:z => 2007-323T08:37:48-06:00 Date and time of day for ordinal date (extended)
%GW%V%uT%H%M%S%z => 2007W471T083748-0600 Date and time of day for week date (basic)
%G-W%V-%uT%T%:z => 2007-W47-1T08:37:48-06:00 Date and time of day for week date (extended)
%Y%m%dT%H%M => 20071119T0837 Calendar date and local time (basic)
%FT%R => 2007-11-19T08:37 Calendar date and local time (extended)
%Y%jT%H%MZ => 2007323T0837Z Ordinal date and UTC of day (basic)
%Y-%jT%RZ => 2007-323T08:37Z Ordinal date and UTC of day (extended)
%GW%V%uT%H%M%z => 2007W471T0837-0600 Week date and local time and difference from UTC (basic)
%G-W%V-%uT%R%:z => 2007-W47-1T08:37-06:00 Week date and local time and difference from UTC (extended)
Create an initializer for it:
# config/initializers/time_formats.rb
Add something like this to it:
Time::DATE_FORMATS[:custom_datetime] = "%d.%m.%Y"
And then use it the following way:
post.updated_at.to_s(:custom_datetime)
⚠️ You have to restart rails server for this to work.
Check the documentation for more information:
Since I18n is the Rails core feature starting from version 2.2 you can use its localize-method. By applying the forementioned strftime %-variables you can specify the desired format under config/locales/en.yml (or whatever language), in your case like this:
time:
formats:
default: '%FT%T'
Or if you want to use this kind of format in a few specific places you can refer it as a variable like this
time:
formats:
specific_format: '%FT%T'
After that you can use it in your views like this:
l(Mode.last.created_at, format: :specific_format)
Sarah Jenkins is a veteran tech journalist with over 12 years of experience covering artificial intelligence, mobile innovations, and digital ethics. Her insights have appeared in leading technology publications worldwide.
