PHP Date format question....

Question

Hi guys. Some folks helped me on http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3326316/how-to-check-the-data-format-in-php post but I need to check two date formats MM-DD-YYYY and DD-MM-YY instead of one. Do I need to setup two regular expression???? Thanks for the help!!!

$date1=05/25/2010;    
$date2=25/05/10;    //I wish both of them would pass 

$date_regex = '!^(0[1-9]|1[012])[- /.](0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])[- /.](19|20)\d\d$!';

if (preg_match($date_regex, $date1)) {
  do something    
}

if (preg_match($date_regex, $date2)) {  // need second Reg. expression??
  do something    
}

Answer 1

Your regex

$date_regex = '!^(0[1-9]|1[012])[- /.](0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])[- /.](19|20)\d\d$!';

matches MM-DD-YYYY format.

The other you want to match is simple

$date_regex2 = '!^(0[1-9]|1[012])[- /.](0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])[- /.]\d\d$!';

You could just check if either is true.

if(preg_match($date_regex,$date) or preg_match($date_regex2,$date)){
  //match
}

Or you could combine them using

$mmddyyyy = '!^(0[1-9]|1[012])[- /.](0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])[- /.](19|20)\d\d$!';
$mmddyy = '!^(0[1-9]|1[012])[- /.](0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])[- /.]\d\d$!';
$regex = "($mmddyyyy|$mmddyy)";

if(preg_match($regex,$date){
  //match
}

Not the most elegant regex but it shold work just fine.