python linear regression predict by date

Question

I want to predict a value at a date in the future with simple linear regression, but I can\'t due to the date format.

This is the dataframe I have:

Answer 1

convert:

1) date to dataframe index

df = df.set_index('date', append=False)

2) convert datetime object to float64 object

df = df.index.to_julian_date()

run the regression with date being the independent variable.