[SimonSays]

Hello All,
I am trying to find a good way to get the current time/date, and then get that time 5 minutes delayed. This is what I am doing to get the current date/time.

$format = "YmjHi";
// Change timezone to GMT.
date_default_timezone_set("GMT");
$gmttime = date($format);

I am new to PHP, but I was hoping there is an easy way for me to subtract a given amount of time from the date/time.

Thanks!

This post has been edited by SimonSays: 22 September 2012 - 02:28 PM

[BenignDesign]

Your best bet will probably be to separate your individual portions (ie, month, day, year, hour, minutes) as each of these variables has the potential to change depending upon your subtraction.

If the current date/time is January 1, 2013, 00:04, and you subtract 5 minutes, your date/time becomes December 31, 2012, 23:59. Each individual variable needs to roll back by one.

I could be wrong, but I would say you would need to set up if statements to determine if the change in minutes is going to change any (or all) of the other variables in the string. I don't think you're going to find an "easy" solution to the problem.

[SimonSays]

That is what I was afraid of! I had starting doing it that way, so I guess that is how I will continue unless someone can point me too a better way.
Thanks for your response.

[nightscream]

There are 2 methods I'll be explaining'

Method #1
You can use the datetime object and his sub function check the php manual for it.
This one is more OO because of the use of objects

Method #2

Default time zone set..
$date = date($format, time() - 60 * 5);

This will substract 5 minutes ( 60 sec * 5)

[JackOfAllTrades]

Or use strtotime:

<?php

$format = "YmjHi";
date_default_timezone_set('GMT');
echo date($format, strtotime("-5 minute")) . "\n";

[RudiVisser]

JackOfAllTrades, on 23 September 2012 - 11:47 AM, said:

<?php
$format = "YmjHi";
date_default_timezone_set('GMT');
echo date($format, strtotime("-5 minute")) . "\n";

This.

Or you can use the newer DateTime classes:

<?php
$format = "YmjHi";
$sub = new DateInterval("PT5M"); // Interval of 5 mins
$date = new DateTime(); // Current time
$date->sub($sub); // Subtract
echo $date->format($format);

[JackOfAllTrades]

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