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Question

javascript: get current date/time in seconds?

Answer 1

+1 A:

Based on your comment, I think you're looking for something like this:

var timeout = new Date().getTime() + 15*60*1000; //add 15 minutes;

Then in your check, you're checking:

if(new Date().getTime() > timeout) {
  alert("Session has expired");
}

Nick Craver 2010-09-30 11:54:15

+1 for a practical solution :-)

Andy E 2010-09-30 12:30:59

Answer 2

+3 A:

var seconds = new Date().getTime() / 1000;

....will give you the seconds since mindnight, 1 Jan 1970

Ref

sje397 2010-09-30 11:56:58

While this is accurate, when would it ever be useful? :)

Nick Craver 2010-09-30 11:58:57

@Nick - this is [Unix time](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_time)

sje397 2010-09-30 12:01:28

@sje397 - Yes...but the question (like most on SO) is most likely to solve a *practical* problem, can you give me an example where you'd want to display this result?

Nick Craver 2010-09-30 12:02:47

@Nick - I think all examples are necessarily speculative and will sound contrived - but I'll take a shot :) Suppose you have data time stamped with unix time, and want to determine it's age. More though I think this is what is most likely meant by 'the current date/time in seconds'; just my gut feeling.

sje397 2010-09-30 12:10:11

When a Date object's *valueOf()* method is called, it returns a number representation. That means that you can completely do away with *getTime()* if you want, since the division mathematical operator will force to a Number via the *valueOf()* method. So your code is exactly the equivalent of `var seconds = new Date() / 1000;`. FWIW ;-)

Andy E 2010-09-30 12:28:13

@Nick: It's very useful when calculating time and timespans. For example: No need to worry if the month is 28, 29, 30 or 31 days or if the year has 365 or 366 days... It might not be very readable for humans, but that is easily converted.

some 2010-09-30 13:50:55

Answer 3

+2 A:

To get the number of seconds from the Javascript epoch use:

date = new Date();
milliseconds = date.getTime();
seconds = milliseconds / 1000;

Lazarus 2010-09-30 11:57:12

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