1.\" 2.\" Copyright (c) 1997 Joerg Wunsch 3.\" 4.\" All rights reserved. 5.\" 6.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 7.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 8.\" are met: 9.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 11.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 12.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 13.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 14.\" 15.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE DEVELOPERS ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR 16.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES 17.\" OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. 18.\" IN NO EVENT SHALL THE DEVELOPERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, 19.\" INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT 20.\" NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, 21.\" DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY 22.\" THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT 23.\" (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF 24.\" THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. 25.\" 26.\" $FreeBSD$ 27.\" " 28.Dd October 2, 2014 29.Dt STRPTIME 3 30.Os 31.Sh NAME 32.Nm strptime 33.Nd parse date and time string 34.Sh LIBRARY 35.Lb libc 36.Sh SYNOPSIS 37.In time.h 38.Ft char * 39.Fo strptime 40.Fa "const char * restrict buf" 41.Fa "const char * restrict format" 42.Fa "struct tm * restrict timeptr" 43.Fc 44.In time.h 45.In xlocale.h 46.Ft char * 47.Fn strptime_l "const char * restrict buf" "const char * restrict format" "struct tm * restrict timeptr" "locale_t loc" 48.Sh DESCRIPTION 49The 50.Fn strptime 51function parses the string in the buffer 52.Fa buf 53according to the string pointed to by 54.Fa format , 55and fills in the elements of the structure pointed to by 56.Fa timeptr . 57The resulting values will be relative to the local time zone. 58Thus, it can be considered the reverse operation of 59.Xr strftime 3 . 60The 61.Fn strptime_l 62function does the same as 63.Fn strptime , 64but takes an explicit locale rather than using the current locale. 65.Pp 66The 67.Fa format 68string consists of zero or more conversion specifications and 69ordinary characters. 70All ordinary characters are matched exactly with the buffer, where 71white space in the format string will match any amount of white space 72in the buffer. 73All conversion specifications are identical to those described in 74.Xr strftime 3 . 75.Pp 76Two-digit year values, including formats 77.Fa %y 78and 79.Fa \&%D , 80are now interpreted as beginning at 1969 per POSIX requirements. 81Years 69-00 are interpreted in the 20th century (1969-2000), years 8201-68 in the 21st century (2001-2068). 83The 84.Fa \&%U 85and 86.Fa %W 87format specifiers accept any value within the range 00 to 53. 88.Pp 89If the 90.Fa format 91string does not contain enough conversion specifications to completely 92specify the resulting 93.Vt struct tm , 94the unspecified members of 95.Va timeptr 96are left untouched. 97For example, if 98.Fa format 99is 100.Dq Li "%H:%M:%S" , 101only 102.Va tm_hour , 103.Va tm_sec 104and 105.Va tm_min 106will be modified. 107If time relative to today is desired, initialize the 108.Fa timeptr 109structure with today's date before passing it to 110.Fn strptime . 111.Sh RETURN VALUES 112Upon successful completion, 113.Fn strptime 114returns the pointer to the first character in 115.Fa buf 116that has not been required to satisfy the specified conversions in 117.Fa format . 118It returns 119.Dv NULL 120if one of the conversions failed. 121.Fn strptime_l 122returns the same values as 123.Fn strptime . 124.Sh SEE ALSO 125.Xr date 1 , 126.Xr scanf 3 , 127.Xr strftime 3 128.Sh HISTORY 129The 130.Fn strptime 131function appeared in 132.Fx 3.0 . 133.Sh AUTHORS 134The 135.Fn strptime 136function has been contributed by Powerdog Industries. 137.Pp 138This man page was written by 139.An J\(:org Wunsch . 140.Sh BUGS 141Both the 142.Fa %e 143and 144.Fa %l 145format specifiers may incorrectly scan one too many digits 146if the intended values comprise only a single digit 147and that digit is followed immediately by another digit. 148Both specifiers accept zero-padded values, 149even though they are both defined as taking unpadded values. 150.Pp 151The 152.Fa %p 153format specifier has no effect unless it is parsed 154.Em after 155hour-related specifiers. 156Specifying 157.Fa %l 158without 159.Fa %p 160will produce undefined results. 161Note that 12AM 162(ante meridiem) 163is taken as midnight 164and 12PM 165(post meridiem) 166is taken as noon. 167.Pp 168The 169.Fa %Z 170format specifier only accepts time zone abbreviations of the local time zone, 171or the value "GMT". 172This limitation is because of ambiguity due to of the over loading of time 173zone abbreviations. 174One such example is 175.Fa EST 176which is both Eastern Standard Time and Eastern Australia Summer Time. 177.Pp 178The 179.Fn strptime 180function does not correctly handle multibyte characters in the 181.Fa format 182argument. 183