STRPTIME(3P)                                        POSIX Programmer's Manual                                       STRPTIME(3P)



PROLOG
       This  manual  page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux implementation of this interface may differ (con-
       sult the corresponding Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the  interface  may  not  be  implemented  on
       Linux.

NAME
       strptime - date and time conversion

SYNOPSIS
       #include <time.h>

       char *strptime(const char *restrict buf, const char *restrict format,
              struct tm *restrict tm);


DESCRIPTION
       The  strptime() function shall convert the character string pointed to by buf to values which are stored in the tm struc-
       ture pointed to by tm, using the format specified by format.

       The format is composed of zero or more directives. Each directive is composed of one of the following: one or more white-
       space  characters (as specified by isspace()); an ordinary character (neither '%' nor a white-space character); or a con-
       version specification.  Each conversion specification is composed of a '%' character followed by a  conversion  character
       which  specifies  the  replacement required. The application shall ensure that there is white-space or other non-alphanu-
       meric characters between any two conversion specifications. The following conversion specifications are supported:

       %a     The day of the week, using the locale's weekday names; either the abbreviated or full name may be specified.

       %A     Equivalent to %a .

       %b     The month, using the locale's month names; either the abbreviated or full name may be specified.

       %B     Equivalent to %b .

       %c     Replaced by the locale's appropriate date and time representation.

       %C     The century number [00,99]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %d     The day of the month [01,31]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %D     The date as %m / %d / %y .

       %e     Equivalent to %d .

       %h     Equivalent to %b .

       %H     The hour (24-hour clock) [00,23]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %I     The hour (12-hour clock) [01,12]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %j     The day number of the year [001,366]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %m     The month number [01,12]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %M     The minute [00,59]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %n     Any white space.

       %p     The locale's equivalent of a.m or p.m.

       %r     12-hour clock time using the AM/PM notation if t_fmt_ampm is not an empty string in the  LC_TIME  portion  of  the
              current locale; in the POSIX locale, this shall be equivalent to %I : %M : %S %p .

       %R     The time as %H : %M .

       %S     The seconds [00,60]; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %t     Any white space.

       %T     The time as %H : %M : %S .

       %U     The  week  number of the year (Sunday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number [00,53]; leading zeros are
              permitted but not required.

       %w     The weekday as a decimal number [0,6], with 0 representing Sunday; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %W     The week number of the year (Monday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number [00,53]; leading  zeros  are
              permitted but not required.

       %x     The date, using the locale's date format.

       %X     The time, using the locale's time format.

       %y     The  year  within  century.  When a century is not otherwise specified, values in the range [69,99] shall refer to
              years 1969 to 1999 inclusive, and values in the range [00,68] shall refer to years 2000 to 2068 inclusive; leading
              zeros shall be permitted but shall not be required.

       Note:
              It  is  expected that in a future version of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 the default century inferred from a 2-digit year
              will change. (This would apply to all commands accepting a 2-digit year as input.)


       %Y     The year, including the century (for example, 1988).

       %%     Replaced by % .


   Modified Conversion Specifiers
       Some conversion specifiers can be modified by the E and O modifier characters to indicate that an alternative  format  or
       specification should be used rather than the one normally used by the unmodified conversion specifier. If the alternative
       format or specification does not exist in the current locale, the behavior shall be as if the unmodified conversion spec-
       ification were used.

       %Ec    The locale's alternative appropriate date and time representation.

       %EC    The name of the base year (period) in the locale's alternative representation.

       %Ex    The locale's alternative date representation.

       %EX    The locale's alternative time representation.

       %Ey    The offset from %EC (year only) in the locale's alternative representation.

       %EY    The full alternative year representation.

       %Od    The day of the month using the locale's alternative numeric symbols; leading zeros are permitted but not required.

       %Oe    Equivalent to %Od .

       %OH    The hour (24-hour clock) using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %OI    The hour (12-hour clock) using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %Om    The month using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %OM    The minutes using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %OS    The seconds using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %OU    The week number of the year (Sunday as the first day of the week) using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %Ow    The number of the weekday (Sunday=0) using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %OW    The week number of the year (Monday as the first day of the week) using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.

       %Oy    The year (offset from %C ) using the locale's alternative numeric symbols.


       A  conversion  specification  composed  of white-space characters is executed by scanning input up to the first character
       that is not white-space (which remains unscanned), or until no more characters can be scanned.

       A conversion specification that is an ordinary character is executed by scanning the next character from the  buffer.  If
       the character scanned from the buffer differs from the one comprising the directive, the directive fails, and the differ-
       ing and subsequent characters remain unscanned.

       A series of conversion specifications composed of %n, %t, white-space characters, or any combination is executed by scan-
       ning  up  to  the  first  character that is not white space (which remains unscanned), or until no more characters can be
       scanned.

       Any other conversion specification is executed by scanning characters until a character matching the  next  directive  is
       scanned,  or  until  no more characters can be scanned. These characters, except the one matching the next directive, are
       then compared to the locale values associated with the conversion specifier. If a match is found, values for  the  appro-
       priate  tm  structure  members  are  set to values corresponding to the locale information. Case is ignored when matching
       items in buf such as month or weekday names. If no match is found, strptime() fails and no more characters are scanned.

RETURN VALUE
       Upon successful completion, strptime() shall return a pointer to the character following the last character parsed.  Oth-
       erwise, a null pointer shall be returned.

ERRORS
       No errors are defined.

       The following sections are informative.

EXAMPLES
       None.

APPLICATION USAGE
       Several  "equivalent  to"  formats and the special processing of white-space characters are provided in order to ease the
       use of identical format strings for strftime() and strptime().

       Applications should use %Y (4-digit years) in preference to %y (2-digit years).

       It is unspecified whether multiple calls to strptime() using the same tm structure will update the  current  contents  of
       the  structure  or  overwrite  all contents of the structure.  Conforming applications should make a single call to strp-
       time() with a format and all data needed to completely specify the date and time being converted.

RATIONALE
       None.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       The strptime() function is expected to be mandatory in the next version of this volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001.

SEE ALSO
       scanf(), strftime(), time(), the Base Definitions volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, <time.h>

COPYRIGHT
       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003  Edition,  Standard  for
       Information  Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 6, Copy-
       right (C) 2001-2003 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the event of any
       discrepancy  between this version and the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group
       Standard  is  the  referee   document.   The   original   Standard   can   be   obtained   online   at   http://www.open-
       group.org/unix/online.html .



IEEE/The Open Group                                           2003                                                  STRPTIME(3P)