Default Date Format in Rails (Need it to be ddmmyyyy)

Question

I\'ve been working with a rails form all day and I was just randomly testing it and tried the date 25/12/2009 and it came up with a huge error.

It was at this point

Answer 1

You can change the date format using internationalisation (I18n)

Just add (or change) this in your config/locales/en.yml:

en:
  date:
    order:
      - :day
      - :month
      - :year

Answer 2

In your settings file: config/environment.rb"

my_date_formats = { :default => '%d/%m/%Y' } 

ActiveSupport::CoreExtensions::Time::Conversions::DATE_FORMATS.merge!(my_date_formats) 

ActiveSupport::CoreExtensions::Date::Conversions::DATE_FORMATS.merge!(my_date_formats) 

source: http://thedevelopercorner.blogspot.com/2009/03/change-default-date-format-in-ruby-on.html

Answer 3

If you're using @Chris Ballance's solution note that Rails now modifies the Date class directly so you'll get an uninitialized constant ActiveSupport error with the solution.

See: uninitialized constant ActiveSupport::CoreExtensions

The updated argument:

my_date_formats = { :default => '%d/%m/%Y' } 
Time::DATE_FORMATS.merge!(my_date_formats) 
Date::DATE_FORMATS.merge!(my_date_formats)

Answer 4

You're looking more for something like this, although that solution still isn't too elegant.

http://source.mihelac.org/2006/9/13/parsing-european-date-format-in-ruby-rails

Answer 5

I solved this by adding getters and setters named mydatefield_formatted which explicitly do what I want, and use those everywhere. Probably a shopping list of reasons not to do this but I quite like it so I thought I'd leave it here.

app/models/mymodel.rb

class Mymodel < ActiveRecord::Base
  include ValueFormatters
  add_value_formatters

  etc.
end

lib/value_formatters.rb

module ValueFormatters
  extend ActiveSupport::Concern

  module ClassMethods

    def add_value_formatters
      columns.each do |column|
        case column.type
          when :datetime
            define_method("#{column.name}_formatted") { General.format_datetime(self.read_attribute(column.name)) }
            define_method("#{column.name}_formatted=") {|value| self.update_attribute(column.name, General.parse_datetime(value)) }
          when :date
            define_method("#{column.name}_formatted") { General.format_date(self.read_attribute(column.name)) }
            define_method("#{column.name}_formatted=") {|value| self.update_attribute(column.name, General.parse_date(value)) }
          when :boolean
            define_method("#{column.name}_formatted") { General.format_boolean(self.read_attribute(column.name)) }
            define_method("#{column.name}_formatted=") {|value| self.update_attribute(column.name, General.parse_boolean(value)) }
          else
            # do nothing
        end unless self.class.respond_to?("#{column.name}_formatted")
      end
    end

  end

end

lib/general.rb

class General

  def self.parse_date(value, end_of_day = false)
    result = nil
    begin
      if value.present?
        if value.length == 8
          result = DateTime.strptime(value, '%d/%m/%y')
          if result.year > Time.new.year + 1
            result = DateTime.new(result.year - 100, result.month, result.day)
          end
        else
          result = DateTime.strptime(value, '%d/%m/%Y')
        end
      end
    rescue Exception=>e
      #
    end
    result = result + 23.hours + 59.minutes + 59.seconds if result && end_of_day
    result
  end

  def self.parse_datetime(value)
    result = nil
    begin
      if value.present?
        result = DateTime.strptime(value, '%d/%m/%Y %H:%M')
        result = nil if result < 100.years.ago
      end
    rescue Exception=>e
      #
    end
    result
  end

  def self.format_date(value)
    value.present? ? value.strftime('%d/%m/%Y') : ''
  end

  def self.format_datetime(value)
    value.present? ? value.strftime('%d/%m/%Y at %H:%M') : ''
  end

  def self.format_boolean(value, default = nil)
    value = default if value == nil
    case value
      when true
        'Yes'
      when false
        'No'
      else
        'Unspecified'
    end
  end

  def self.parse_boolean(value, default = false)
    case value.to_s.downcase
      when 'true'
      when 'yes'
      when '1'
      when 'on'
        true
      when 'false'
      when 'no'
      when '0'
      when 'off'
        false
      else
        default
    end
  end

end

Answer 6

Updated I18n...

date:
  formats:
    default: "%m/%d/%Y"
    short: "%b %d"
    long: "%B %d, %Y"