Converting “YYYYMMDDHHMMSS” Dates

Sometimes you end up dealing with date values which are in the form of “YYYYMMDDHHMMSS:00000-GMT” (where “GMT” is a multiple of hours * 60 deviation from Greenwich Mean Time).  Formatting those into usable date values can be done several ways.  This is just one way.  And I threw in a somewhat not-so-obvious KiXtart version of this function for the hell of it.

VBScript version

Function mDate(strDate, format)
    Dim tmp, retval
    On Error Resume Next
    Select Case Lcase(format)
        Case "short":
            tmp = Mid(strDate, 5, 2) & "/" & _
                Mid(strDate, 7, 2) & "/" & _
                Left(strDate,4)
            retval = FormatDateTime(tmp, vbShortDate)
        Case "datetime":
            tmp = Mid(strDate, 5, 2) & "/" & _
                Mid(strDate, 7, 2) & "/" & _
                Left(strDate,4) & " " & _
                Mid(strDate, 9, 2) & ":" & _
                Mid(strDate, 11, 2) & ":" & _
                Mid(strDate, 13, 2)
            retval = FormatDateTime(tmp, vbShortDate) & " " & _
            FormatDateTime(tmp, vbLongTime)
        Case "long":
            tmp = Mid(strDate, 5, 2) & "/" & _
                Mid(strDate, 7, 2) & "/" & _
                Left(strDate,4) & " " & _
                Mid(strDate, 9, 2) & ":" & _
                Mid(strDate, 11, 2) & ":" & _
                Mid(strDate, 13, 2)
            retval = FormatDateTime(tmp, vbLongDate)
    End Select
    mDate = retval
End Function


wscript.echo mDate("20100305132705.00000-520", "short")
wscript.echo mDate("20100305132705.00000-520", "long")
wscript.echo mDate("20100305132705.00000-520", "datetime")

KiXtart Version

Function FormatDateTime($v, $f)
    Dim $sc, $result
    $sc = CreateObject("ScriptControl")
    $sc.Language = "vbscript"
    $result = $sc.Eval('FormatDateTime("'+$v+'",'+$f+')')
    $sc = 0
    $FormatDateTime = $result
EndFunction

Function mDate($strDate, $format)
    Dim $tmp, $retval
    Select
        Case $format = "short"
            $tmp = Substr($strDate, 5, 2) + "/" +
                Substr($strDate, 7, 2) + "/" +
                Left($strDate,4)
                $retval = $tmp
        Case Lcase($format) = "datetime"
            $tmp = Substr($strDate, 5, 2) + "/" +
                Substr($strDate, 7, 2) + "/" +
                Left($strDate,4) + " " +
                Substr($strDate, 9, 2) + ":" +
                Substr($strDate, 11, 2) + ":" +
                Substr($strDate, 13, 2)
            $retval = $tmp
        Case Lcase($format) = "long"
            $tmp = Substr($strDate, 5, 2) + "/" +
                Substr($strDate, 7, 2) + "/" +
                Left($strDate,4)
                $tmp = FormatDateTime($tmp, "vbLongDate")
            $retval = $tmp
    EndSelect
    $mDate = $retval
EndFunction


? mDate("20100305132705.00000-520", "short")
? mDate("20100305132705.00000-520", "long")
? mDate("20100305132705.00000-520", "datetime")

Yes, the KiXtart version is somewhat “cheating” but who cares.  It works, and it saves me a little bit of coding.  The performance overhead delta is near-zero, unless you’re running on 1990’s hardware.