Scripts > Class elements and c++ instructions > Other functions > time

Converts the present date and time into a string. If the function is called without parameter or with an empty string, then the resulting string contains 26 characters in the following format:

To get another format, the function can be called with a format string. This string is a combination of normal text and formatting characters followed on "%". The possible formatting characters are listed in the following table:

Format character	Meaning	Example
a	Abbreviated weekday name	Sun
A	Full weekday name	Sunday
b	Abbreviated month name	Feb
B	Full month name	February
c	Date and time	Feb 29 14:34:56 1984
d	Day of the month	29
H	Hour of the 24-hour day	14
I	Hour of the 12-hour day	02
j	Day of the year, from 001	60
m	Month of the year, from 01	02
M	Minutes after the hour	34
p	AM/PM indicator, if any AM	AM
S	Seconds after the minute	56
U	Sunday week of the year, from 00
w	Day of the week, with 0 for Sunday	0
W	Monday week of the year, from 00
x	Date	Feb 29 1984
X	Time	14:34:56
y	Year of the century, from 00 (deprecated)	84
Y	Year	1984
Z	Time zone name	PST or PDT

out << time_stamp("It is %M minutes after %I o'clock (%Z) %A, %B %d %Y") << endl;