class Date { }

A Date is an immutable object identifying a day in the Gregorian calendar.

Date objects support addition and subtraction of integers, where an integer is interpreted as the number of days. You can compare Date objects with the numeric comparison operators ==, <, <=, >, >=, !=. Their stringification in YYYY-MM-DD format means that comparing them with the string operators eq, lt, le etc. also gives the right result.

Date.today creates an object the current day according to the system clock.

my $d = Date.new(2015, 12, 24); # Christmas Eve!
    say $d;                         # OUTPUT: «2015-12-24␤»
    say $d.year;                    # OUTPUT: «2015␤»
    say $d.month;                   # OUTPUT: «12␤»
    say $d.day;                     # OUTPUT: «24␤»
    say $d.day-of-week;             # OUTPUT: «4␤» (Thursday)
    say $d.later(days => 20);       # OUTPUT: «2016-01-13␤»
    my $n = Date.new('2015-12-31'); # New Year's Eve
    say $n - $d;                    # OUTPUT: «7␤», 7 days between New Years/Christmas Eve
    say $n + 1;                     # OUTPUT: «2016-01-01␤»

Note since version 6.d, .raku can be called on Date.

Methods

method new

multi method new($year, $month, $day, :&formatter --> Date:D)
    multi method new(:$year!, :$month = 1, :$day = 1  --> Date:D)
    multi method new(Str $date                        --> Date:D)
    multi method new(Instant:D $dt                    --> Date:D)
    multi method new(DateTime:D $dt                   --> Date:D)

Creates a new Date object, either from a triple of (year, month, day) that can be coerced to integers, or from a string of the form YYYY-MM-DD (ISO 8601), or from an Instant or DateTime object. Optionally accepts a formatter as a named parameter.

my $date = Date.new(2042, 1, 1);
    $date = Date.new(year => 2042, month => 1, day => 1);
    $date = Date.new("2042-01-01");
    $date = Date.new(Instant.from-posix: 1482155532);
    $date = Date.new(DateTime.now);

Since Rakudo 2022.03, the "day" argument can also be a callable, with * representing the last day in a month, and the possibility of getting to the day counting from the last one:

say Date.new(2042, 2, *); # OUTPUT: «2042-02-28␤»
    say Date.new(2044, 2, *); # OUTPUT: «2044-02-29␤»

method new-from-daycount

method new-from-daycount($daycount,:&formatter --> Date:D)

Creates a new Date object given $daycount which is the number of days from epoch Nov. 17, 1858, i.e. the Modified Julian Day. Optionally accepts a formatter as a named parameter.

say Date.new-from-daycount(49987);          # OUTPUT: «1995-09-27␤»

method daycount

method daycount(Date:D: --> Int:D)

Returns the number of days from epoch Nov. 17, 1858, i.e. the Modified Julian Day.

method last-date-in-month

method last-date-in-month(Date:D: --> Date:D)

Returns the last date in the month of the Date object. Otherwise, returns the invocant if the day value is already the last day of the month.

say Date.new('2015-11-24').last-date-in-month; # OUTPUT: «2015-11-30␤»

This should allow for much easier ranges like

$date .. $date.last-date-in-month

for all remaining dates in the month.

method first-date-in-month

method first-date-in-month(Date:D: --> Date:D)

Returns the first date in the month of the Date object. Otherwise, returns the invocant if the day value is already the first day of the month.

say Date.new('2015-11-24').first-date-in-month; # OUTPUT: «2015-11-01␤»

method clone

method clone(Date:D: :$year, :$month, :$day, :&formatter)

Creates a new Date object based on the invocant, but with the given arguments overriding the values from the invocant.

say Date.new('2015-11-24').clone(month => 12);    # OUTPUT: «2015-12-24␤»

method today

method today(:&formatter --> Date:D)

Returns a Date object for the current day. Optionally accepts a formatter named parameter.

say Date.today;

method truncated-to

method truncated-to(Date:D: Cool $unit)

Returns a Date truncated to the first day of its year, month or week. For example

my $c = Date.new('2012-12-24');
    say $c.truncated-to('year');     # OUTPUT: «2012-01-01␤»
    say $c.truncated-to('month');    # OUTPUT: «2012-12-01␤»
    say $c.truncated-to('week');     # OUTPUT: «2012-12-24␤», because it's Monday already

method succ

method succ(Date:D: --> Date:D)

Returns a Date of the following day. "succ" is short for "successor".

say Date.new("2016-02-28").succ;   # OUTPUT: «2016-02-29␤»

method pred

method pred(Date:D: --> Date:D)

Returns a Date of the previous day. "pred" is short for "predecessor".

say Date.new("2016-01-01").pred;   # OUTPUT: «2015-12-31␤»

method Str

multi method Str(Date:D: --> Str:D)

Returns a string representation of the invocant, as specified by the formatter. If no formatter was specified, an (ISO 8601) date will be returned.

say Date.new('2015-12-24').Str;                     # OUTPUT: «2015-12-24␤»

my $fmt = { sprintf "%02d/%02d/%04d", .month, .day, .year };
    say Date.new('2015-12-24', formatter => $fmt).Str;  # OUTPUT: «12/24/2015␤»

method gist

multi method gist(Date:D: --> Str:D)

Returns the date in YYYY-MM-DD format (ISO 8601)

say Date.new('2015-12-24').gist;                    # OUTPUT: «2015-12-24␤»

method Date

method Date(--> Date)

Returns the invocant.

say Date.new('2015-12-24').Date;  # OUTPUT: «2015-12-24␤»
    say Date.Date;                    # OUTPUT: «(Date)␤»

method DateTime

multi method DateTime(Date:U: --> DateTime:U)
    multi method DateTime(Date:D: --> DateTime:D)

Converts the invocant to DateTime

say Date.new('2015-12-24').DateTime; # OUTPUT: «2015-12-24T00:00:00Z␤»
    say Date.DateTime;                   # OUTPUT: «(DateTime)␤»

method Int

multi method Int(Date:D: --> Int:D)

Converts the invocant to Int. The same value can be obtained with the daycount method.

Available as of release 2023.02 of the Rakudo compiler.

method Real

multi method Real(Date:D: --> Int:D)

Converts the invocant to Int. The same value can be obtained with the daycount method.

Available as of release 2023.02 of the Rakudo compiler.

method Numeric

multi method Numeric(Date:D: --> Int:D)

Converts the invocant to Int. The same value can be obtained with the daycount method. This allows Date objects to be used directly in arithmetic operations.

Available as of release 2023.02 of the Rakudo compiler.

Functions

sub infix:<->

multi infix:<-> (Date:D, Int:D --> Date:D)
    multi infix:<-> (Date:D, Date:D --> Int:D)

Takes a date to subtract from and either an Int, representing the number of days to subtract, or another Date object. Returns a new Date object or the number of days between the two dates, respectively.

say Date.new('2016-12-25') - Date.new('2016-12-24'); # OUTPUT: «1␤»
    say Date.new('2015-12-25') - Date.new('2016-11-21'); # OUTPUT: «-332␤»
    say Date.new('2016-11-21') - 332;                    # OUTPUT: «2015-12-25␤»

sub infix:<+>

multi infix:<+> (Date:D, Int:D --> Date:D)
    multi infix:<+> (Int:D, Date:D --> Date:D)

Takes an Int and adds that many days to the given Date object.

say Date.new('2015-12-25') + 332; # OUTPUT: «2016-11-21␤»
    say 1 + Date.new('2015-12-25');   # OUTPUT: «2015-12-26␤»