How do you compare just the time of a Date in Swift?

Question

I have two Date Objects:

1. 2017-01-13 11:40:17 +0000

2. 2016-03-15 10:22:14 +0000

I need to compare

Answer 1

There's no standard type for a time-of-day. A reasonable type to start with is just a tuple:

typealias TimeOfDay = (hour: Int, minute: Int, second: Int)

To create these TimeOfDay values, you'll need a Calendar. By default, a Calendar uses the device's system-wide time zone. If you don't want that, set the Calendar's time zone explicitly. Example:

var calendar = Calendar.autoupdatingCurrent
calendar.timeZone = TimeZone(abbreviation: "UTC")!

Now you can use a DateFormatter to convert strings to Dates (if necessary), and then use calendar to extract the time-of-day components from the Dates:

let strings: [String] = ["2017-01-13 11:40:17 +0000", "2016-03-15 10:22:14 +0000"]
let parser = DateFormatter()
parser.dateFormat = "yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss Z"
let timesOfDay: [TimeOfDay] = strings.map({ (string) -> TimeOfDay in
    let components = calendar.dateComponents([.hour, .minute, .second], from: parser.date(from: string)!)
    return (hour: components.hour!, minute: components.minute!, second: components.second!)
})

Swift.print(timesOfDay)
// Output: [(11, 40, 17), (10, 22, 14)]

Finally, you can compare these TimeOfDay values. Swift comes with standard comparison operators for tuples whose elements are Comparable, so this TimeOfDay type qualifies. You can just say this:

if timesOfDay[0] < timesOfDay[1] {
    Swift.print("date[0] comes first")
} else if timesOfDay[0] == timesOfDay[1] {
    Swift.print("times are equal")
} else {
    Swift.print("date[1] comes first")
}

Answer 2

This is the route I took in the end, which makes it easy to compare just the time of a Date in swift

New Object Time:

class Time: Comparable, Equatable {
init(_ date: Date) {
    //get the current calender
    let calendar = Calendar.current

    //get just the minute and the hour of the day passed to it
    let dateComponents = calendar.dateComponents([.hour, .minute], from: date)

        //calculate the seconds since the beggining of the day for comparisions
        let dateSeconds = dateComponents.hour! * 3600 + dateComponents.minute! * 60

        //set the varibles
        secondsSinceBeginningOfDay = dateSeconds
        hour = dateComponents.hour!
        minute = dateComponents.minute!
    }

    init(_ hour: Int, _ minute: Int) {
        //calculate the seconds since the beggining of the day for comparisions
        let dateSeconds = hour * 3600 + minute * 60

        //set the varibles
        secondsSinceBeginningOfDay = dateSeconds
        self.hour = hour
        self.minute = minute
    }

    var hour : Int
    var minute: Int

    var date: Date {
        //get the current calender
        let calendar = Calendar.current

        //create a new date components.
        var dateComponents = DateComponents()

        dateComponents.hour = hour
        dateComponents.minute = minute

        return calendar.date(byAdding: dateComponents, to: Date())!
    }

    /// the number or seconds since the beggining of the day, this is used for comparisions
    private let secondsSinceBeginningOfDay: Int

    //comparisions so you can compare times
    static func == (lhs: Time, rhs: Time) -> Bool {
        return lhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay == rhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay
    }

    static func < (lhs: Time, rhs: Time) -> Bool {
        return lhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay < rhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay
    }

    static func <= (lhs: Time, rhs: Time) -> Bool {
        return lhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay <= rhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay
    }


    static func >= (lhs: Time, rhs: Time) -> Bool {
        return lhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay >= rhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay
    }


    static func > (lhs: Time, rhs: Time) -> Bool {
        return lhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay > rhs.secondsSinceBeginningOfDay
    }
}

Date Extension for easy access: //Adds ability to just get the time from a date:

extension Date {
    var time: Time {
        return Time(self)
    }
}

Example:

let firstDate = Date()
let secondDate = firstDate

//Will return true
let timeEqual = firstDate.time == secondDate.time