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Dates
Parsing

Parse a date and time from a string

Given the string "2008-05-06 13:29", parse it as a date representing 6th March, 2008 1:29:00pm in the local time zone.
groovy
def date = new SimpleDateFormat("yyy-MM-dd HH:mm").parse("2008-05-06 13:29")
def date = Date.parse("yyy-MM-dd HH:mm", "2008-05-06 13:29")
erlang
% AFAIK, no datetime-parsing library exists; 'parse_to_datetime' is a simplistic, problem-specific hack
LocalDateTime = erlang:universaltime_to_localtime(parse_to_datetime("2008-05-06 13:29:34")),
csharp
DateTime parsedDate = DateTime.Parse("2008-05-06 13:29");
// Ideally, you would catch the potential FormatException or use DateTime.TryParse in production code.
Printing

Display information about a date

Display the day of month, day of year, month name and day name of the day 8 days from now.
groovy
use (TimeCategory) {
eight_days_time = 1.week.from.now + 1.day
}
println eight_days_time[DAY_OF_MONTH]
println eight_days_time.format('d') // alternative to above
println eight_days_time[DAY_OF_YEAR]
println eight_days_time.format('MMMM')
println eight_days_time.format('EEEE')
csharp
DateTime date = DateTime.Today.AddDays(8);

Console.WriteLine("Day of month: " + date.Day);
Console.WriteLine("Day of year: " + date.DayOfYear);
Console.WriteLine("Month name: " + date.ToString("MMMM"));
Console.WriteLine("Day name: " + date.ToString("dddd"));

// The two ToString calls will use the current locale.
// To get localised month and day names, see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/8tfzyc64.aspx

Display a date in different locales

Display a language/locale friendly version of New Year's Day for 2009 for several languages/locales. E.g. for languages English, French, German, Italian, Dutch the output might be something like:

Thursday, January 1, 2009
jeudi 1 janvier 2009
giovedì 1 gennaio 2009
Donnerstag, 1. Januar 2009
donderdag 1 januari 2009

(Indicate in comments where possible if any language specific or operating system configuration needs to be in place.)
groovy
cal = Calendar.instance
cal.set(2009, JANUARY, 1)
[ENGLISH, FRENCH, ITALIAN, GERMAN, new Locale('nl')].each { lang ->
println getDateInstance(FULL, lang).format(cal.time)
}

// relies on Java I18N capabilities which supports many locales, see:
// http://java.sun.com/javase/technologies/core/basic/intl/
// available Locales may depend on your version of Java and/or
// operating system and/or installed fonts
csharp
using System.Globalization;

DateTime newYearsDay = new DateTime(2009, 1, 1);
CultureInfo[] locales = {
CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("en-US"),
CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("fr-FR"),
CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("de-DE"),
CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("it-IT"),
CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("nl-NL")
};

foreach (CultureInfo locale in locales)
{
Console.WriteLine(newYearsDay.ToString("D", locale));
}
Creation

Display the current date and time

Create a Date object representing the current date and time. Print it out.
If you can also do this without creating a Date object you can show that too.
groovy
println new Date()
erlang
io:format("~p~n", [calendar:local_time()])
csharp
// Creating a variable first:
DateTime now = DateTime.Now;
Console.WriteLine(now);

// Without creating a variable:
Console.WriteLine(DateTime.Now);