NAME¶

Data::Faker::DateTime - Data::Faker plugin

SYNOPSIS AND USAGE¶

See Data::Faker

DATA PROVIDERS¶

unixtime

Return a unix time (seconds since the epoch) for a random time between the epoch and now.

date

Return a random date as a string, using a random date format (see date_format).

time

Return a random time as a string, using a random time format (see time_format).

rfc822

Return an RFC 822 formatted random date. This method may not work on systems using a non-GNU strftime implementation (kindly let me know if that is the case.)

ampm

Returns am or pm randomly (in the current locale) using one of the formats specified in ampm_format.

time_format

Return a random time format.

date_format

Return a random date format.

ampm_format

Return a random am/pm format.

datetime_format

Return a random date and time format.

month

Return a random month name, unabbreviated, in the current locale.

month_abbr

Return a random month name, abbreviated, in the current locale.

weekday

Return a random weekday name, unabbreviated, in the current locale.

weekday_abbr

Return a random weekday name, abbreviated, in the current locale.

sqldate

Return a random date in the ISO8601 format commonly used by SQL servers (YYYY-MM-DD).

datetime_locale

Return a datetime string in the preferred date representation for the current locale, for a random date.

date_locale

Return a date string in the preferred date representation for the current locale, for a random date.

time_locale

Return a time string in the preferred date representation for the current locale, for a random date.

century

Return a random century number.

dayofmonth

Return a random day of the month.

UTILITY METHODS¶

Data::Faker::DateTime::timestr($format);

Given a strftime format specifier, this method passes it through to POSIX::strftime along with a random date to display in that format.

Perl passes this through to the strftime function of your system library, so it is possible that some of the formatting tokens used here will not work on your system.

NOTES AND CAVEATS¶

Be careful building timestamps from pieces

Be very careful about building date/time representations in formats that are not already listed here. For example if you wanted to get a date that consists of just the month and day, you should NOT do this:

  my $faker = Data::Faker->new();
  print join(' ',$faker->month,$faker->dayofmonth)."\n";
    

This is bad because you might end up with 'February 31' for example. Instead you should use the timestr utility function to provide you a formatted time for a valid date, or better still, write a plugin function that does it:

  my $faker = Data::Faker->new();
  print $faker->my_short_date()."\n";
  package Data::Faker::MyExtras;
  use base qw(Data::Faker);
  use Data::Faker::DateTime;
  __PACKAGE__->register_plugin(
    my_short_date => sub { Data::Faker::DateTime::timestr('%M %e') },
  );
    

POSIX::strftime

See the documentation above regarding the timestr utility method for some caveats related to strftime and your system library.

SEE ALSO¶

Data::Faker

AUTHOR¶

Jason Kohles, <email@jasonkohles.com>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE¶

Copyright 2004-2005 by Jason Kohles

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.