Date Formatter

A simple service to format a date in constant format(s) across a PHP project / API.

Table of contents

• How to install
• How to use
  • The parser
  • The formatter
  • The Service Provider

How to install

PHP 7 is required. Install with composer:

composer require mducharme/date-formatter

How to use

Ready-to-use, with a Pimple container:

$container = new \Pimple\Container();
$container->register(new \Mducharme\DateFormatter\ServiceProvider());


$formatter = $container['date/formatter'];
$displayDate = $formatter->format($date);

With the services directly:

$formatter = new \Mducharme\DateFormatter\Formatter(
    new \Mducharme\DateFormatter\Parser()
);
$displayDate = $formatter->format($date);

The parser

In addition to the Formatter, a Parser service is also included. It has a single purpose, to ensure a mixed value, either a DateTime object or a parsable string, is parsed a DateTime object.

Any invalid string or parameter will throw an exception (\InvalidArgumentException) when parsing. Except null value, which are allowed by default but may be disallowed with a parameter to the parse() method. In thoses cases, null will be returned by the parse() method instead of a \DateTimeInterface object if it is allowed as a parameter.

use \Mducharme\DateFormatter\Parser;

$parser = new Parser();

// Setting the strict mode to false allows a parser that will not throw exceptions.
$softParser = new Parser(false);

// With proper parameters, the parser returns (parsed) Datetime objects
$parser->parse('now');

// With invalid string or types of parameter, the strict parser throws an `\InvalidArgumentException`.
$parser->parse('-invalid-');
$parser->parse(new InvalidObject());
$oarser->parse(false);

Handling null:

// By default, null is allowed. 
// Parsing returns null in this case, instead of the usual DateTimeInterface.
$parser->parse(null);

// If null is disallowed, attempting to parse a null value also throws an `\InvalidArgumentException`.
$parser->parse(null, false);

As a single-purpose service, the Parser is also invokable and may be called directly:

$parsed = $parser($date);

The Formatter

The formatter is the main Service provided by this library. It has a single purpose, to render a DateTime object into a formatted string (or multiple formats).

As a single-purpose service, the Formatter is also invokable:

echo $formatter($date, 'atom');

It comes with many formats by default. See the Formatter source file for details on the default format. You may get an array of all available formats by using Formatter::ALL as the format parameter:

$formatter = new Formatter($parser);
$allFormats = $formatter($date, Formatter::ALL);
var_dump($allFormats);

It is possible to add custom formats, or overwrite default ones, by passing an optional array of formats to the Formatter constructor.

$customFormats = [
    'is-leap-year' => function(\DateTimeInterface $date) {
        return ($date->format('L') ? 'Yes' : 'No';
    },
    'custom-string' => 'H:i:S (u) d-m-Y'
];
$formatter = new Formatter($parser, $customFormats);

// Outputs "Yes" because 2012 was a leap year
echo $formatter(new DateTime('2012-01-01'), 'is-leap-year');

// Outputs the custom format
echo $formatter(new DateTime('2012-01-01'), 'custom-string');

It is also possible to return an array of formatted dates, by specifying an array of formats:

$formats = $formatter('2012-01-01', ['atom', 'custom-string', 'is-leap-year']);

Formats can either be a string, which will be formatted with DateTimeInterface::format() or a callback function with the following signature:

/**
 * @param \DateTimeInterface A date object.
 * @return string
 */
function callback(\DateTimeInterface $date);

If no $format is provided to the format() method (2nd parameter), then the default one will be used. Setting the default format is possible with the constructor. It is optional and will default to the 'atom' format.

// This will use the "atom" format as no default format was specified to the constructor
$formatter1 = new Formatter($parser, null, null);
echo $formatter1($date);

// This will use the "rfc822" format, as it was set as default
$formatter2 = new Formatter($parser, null, 'rfc822');
echo $formatter2($date);

The Service Provider

As a convenience, a Pimple Service Provider is also included for an already bootstrapped parser (date/parser) and formatter (date/formatter).

$container = new \Pimple\Container();
$container->register(new \Mducharme\DateFormatter\ServiceProvider());

$parser = $container['date/parser'];
$formatter = $container['date/formatter'];

To customize the options, the date/custom-formats and date/default-format container options can be extended.