Classic ASP Discussion - Date Question

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Date Question

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Category: General Discussion
Forum Name: Classic ASP Discussion
Forum Description: Discussion on Active Server Pages (Classic ASP).
URL: https://forums.webwiz.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=15200
Printed Date: 30 March 2026 at 6:24am
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.08 - https://www.webwizforums.com

Topic: Date Question

Posted By: bootcom
Subject: Date Question
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 7:58pm

Hi guys,

Got a slight query, and Im looking for opinions on working out how long user has been online.

I have remodelled the entire forums to run from arrays, as I am using Access I need all the performance boosters I can get.

Where I am needing my advise is when coming to the new profile page (That I currently have within development) I want the page to show how many years, months, days the user has been a member with me. Now the process i have been using is extremely long winded and I would like someone to suggest a simplified version of how to do it.

It would appear like this on the page:

This user has been a member for x years, y months and z days

Any takers?

Replies:

Posted By: Phat
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 9:31pm

use datediff http://www.devguru.com/Technologies/vbscript/quickref/datediff.html - http://www.devguru.com/Technologies/vbscript/quickref/datediff.html

then check for the number of years, months and days.

Posted By: ub3rl337ch3ch
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 9:42pm

To start with you'll want to add a date/time field to the user table (where login/contact details and such are kept) where the default value is now()

You could then use the DateDiff function, but that can only return the number of days OR months OR years between two dates, so you'll end up with 7839 days or something ludicrous, so you have to be creative... or get someone else to be creative for you.

Dim YearsSince, MonthsSince, DaysSince, JoinDate, JoinDay, NowDay

sql = "SELECT JoinDate FROM tblUser WHERE UserID=" & [whatever]

vrec.open sql,adoCon

JoinDate = vrec("JoinDate")

vrec.close

YearsSince = DateDiff(yyyy,JoinDate,Date)

MonthsSince = DateDiff(m,JoinDate,Date)

'this provides the total months, so we have to account for the number of years that have gone past

MonthsSince = MonthsSince - 12*YearsSince

'if the difference in months is negative then even though the datediff for years may be 1, it is still less than a year between them

if MonthsSince < 0 then

YearsSince = YearsSince - 1

MonthsSince = MonthsSince * -1

end if

'Now we use datepart to wrok out the days

JoinDay = DatePart("d",JoinDate)

NowDay = DatePart("d",Date)

DaysSince = NowDay - JoinDay

'the same applies with any difference in days as difference in months

if DaysSince < 0 then

MonthsSince = MonthsSince - 1

'here you have to account for months of different length, based on whether the month part of the join date is 4,6,9,11 or 1,3,5,7,8,10,12 or 2. This i'm still working on, and i'll post if i can work it out

end if

response.write "This user has been on for " & YearsSince & " years, " & MonthsSince & " months and " & DaysSince & " days."

Posted By: bootcom
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 9:51pm

Phat, thanks for your reply dude. That's how I began working it out, sorry I declined to mention that. I was looking at suggestions at improving my current functionality which is as ub3rl337ch3ch is doing ends up being the same methodology as the one Im currently using. Good to know Im on the right lines though chaps !!

Posted By: ub3rl337ch3ch
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 10:25pm

aside from the above, all you can really do is work out the datediff then work out how many lots of 365 go into each, so you find

x = datediff("yyyy",JoinDate,Date)

y = datediff("m",JoinDate,Date) mod 12

z = datediff("d",JoinDate,Date) mod 365

z = z mod 12

but then you still have to account for differences in month and year length, and you still have to determine whether

i think the method you're using is the best you can hope for, unless someone knows of some groovy other function... :p

Posted By: bootcom
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 10:35pm

That still wouldn't really give me what I needed though mate ....

I played about with what I was doing and came up with a function, just tested it and works great although it is a bit long winded....

What ya reckon



Private Function tellMeTheDMY(dateJoined)



Dim totalYears

Dim totalMonths

Dim totalDays

Dim splitDate

Dim tempDate

Dim tempNum



' Get the total years this user has been a member

totalYears = dateDiff("yyyy", dateJoined, date())



' Now split the date joined variable

splitDate = split(dateJoined, "/")



' Now create a temporary date with the current year in there

tempDate = splitDate(0) & "/" & splitDate(1) & "/" & year(now())



' Now if the tempDate is before the current date we know for definate that they have been here

' for totalYears years (if that makes sense) If not subtract a year.

If cDate(tempDate) > date() then totalYears = totalYears - 1



' Now we need to get the total amount of months this user has been a member

totalMonths = DateDiff("m", dateJoined, date())



' If this user has been a member for over one year then obviously there will be some confusion

' setting in as the amount of months will be over 12 (which isn't practicle for our needs)



' So what we need to do now is calculate the amount of months the user has actually been with us

' For each year the user has been a member take away 12 months from the value

If totalMonths > 12 then

Do until totalMonths < 12

totalMonths = totalMonths - 12

Loop

End If



' Now to work out the days the user has been signed up to the site



tempNum = (totalYears * 12) + totalMonths



' First of all using the months/years the user has been on the site and add them together 

' to form a date

tempDate = DateAdd("m", tempNum, dateJoined)



' Now work out the amount of days between the tempdate variable and the current date

totalDays = DateDiff("d", tempDate, now())



tellMeTheDMY = "This user has been a member for " & totalYears & " and " & totalMonths & " and " &totalDays



End Function

Posted By: ub3rl337ch3ch
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 11:02pm

you could use dateadd for the entire thing:

x = datepart("yyyy", joindate)

x = dateadd("yyyy",-x,Date)

totalYears = Datepart("yyyy",x)

x = datepart("m", joindate)

x = dateadd("m",-x,Date)

if x <0 then

totalYears = totalYears - 1

x = 12 + x

end if

totalMonths = Datepart("m",x)

and then use your last bit for working out the day... that's the best way i can see to avoid having to calculate leap years etc.

I know its just more of the same, but its a different way, and you way want to just test for speed... this one might be faster by virtue of avoiding loops... not sure which functions are faster to process.

Posted By: bootcom
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 11:06pm

Ok now dont ask me why lol but for some reason the



totalDays = DateDiff("d", tempDate, now())

Needs to be specified whether it is after / before the current day number other wise it spits out minuses and allsorts Dead

So by putting in an extra couple of lines here:



If day(tempdate) < day(date()) then

totalDays = DateDiff("d", tempDate, date())

Else

totalDays = DateDiff("d", date(), tempDate)

End If

The code still does what it's employed to do and now remains error free.

Will give your way a go though, it's always proper helpful to get second and third opinions doing these things so thanks for bearing with me. Will get a performance test done on both and see which comes out faster.

Posted By: ub3rl337ch3ch
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 11:28pm

ah, well in regards to the totalDays thing, use Date() instead of Now()... it shouldnt be an issue that way...

Posted By: bootcom
Date Posted: 23 May 2005 at 11:32pm

Yeah, it still was an issue. But thats cool. I guess I could have done:

replace(totalDays, "-", "")

too which would would have nullified that problems also.