PHP Date Function

• The PHP date() function is used to format a time or a date.
• The PHP date() function formats a timestamp to a more readable date and time.

Syntax:

• date(format,timestamp)

Parameter	Description
Format	Required. Specifies the format of the timestamp
Timestamp	Optional. Specifies a timestamp. Default is the current date andtime (as a timestamp)

PHP Date -What is a Timestamp?
A timestamp is the number of seconds since January 1, 1970 at 00:00:00 GMT. This is also known as the Unix Timestamp.

PHP Date -Format the Date
The first parameter in the date() function specifies how to format the date/time. It uses letters to represent date and time formats. Here are some of the letters that can be used:

• d -The day of the month (01-31)
• m -The current month, as a number (01-12)
• Y -The current year in four digits

Example:
echo date("Y/m/d");
echo date("Y.m.d");
echo date("Y-m-d");

Output:
2009/07/11
2009.07.11
2009-07-11

PHP Date -Adding a Timestamp

• The second parameter in the date() function specifies a timestamp. This parameter is optional. If you do not supply a timestamp, the current time will be used.
• In our next example we will use themktime() function to create a timestamp for tomorrow.
• The mktime() function returns the Unix timestamp for a specified date.

Syntax:

• mktime(hour,minute,second,month,day,year,is_dst) 
• To go one day in the future we simply add one to the day argument of mktime().

Example:
$tomorrow =mktime(0,0,0,date("m"),date("d")+1,date("Y"));
echo "Tomorrow is ".date("Y/m/d", $tomorrow);

Output:
Tomorrow is 2006/07/12