Q:

Comparing two date strings in Python

Let's say I have a string: "10/12/13" and "10/15/13", how can I convert them into date objects so that I can compare the dates? For example to see which date is before or after.

A:

Use datetime.datetime.strptime:
>>> from datetime import datetime as dt
>>> a = dt.strptime("10/12/13", "%m/%d/%y")
>>> b = dt.strptime("10/15/13", "%m/%d/%y")
>>> a > b
False
>>> a < b
True
>>>

A:

If you like to use the dateutil and its parser:
from dateutil.parser import parse

date1 = parse('10/12/13')
date2 = parse('10/15/13')

print date1 - date2
print date2 > date2

A:

Here's one solution using datetime.datetime.strptime:
>>> date1 = datetime.datetime.strptime('10/12/13', '%m/%d/%y')
>>> date2 = datetime.datetime.strptime('10/15/13', '%m/%d/%y')
>>> date1 < date2
True
>>> date1 > date2
False

