[Tutor] date formatter

[Timothy Grant]

On Wed, Aug 6, 2008 at 11:01 PM, Christopher Spears
<cspears2002 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Hey,
>
> I'm working on a problem out of Core Python Programming (2nd Edition).  Basically, I'm creating a class that formats dates.  Here is what I have so far:
>
> #!/usr/bin/python
>
> import time
>
> class date_format(object):
>        def __init__(self, month, day, year):
>                month_dict = {("jan","january") : 1,
>                              ("feb","february") :2,
>                              ("mar", "march") : 3,
>                              ("apr", "april") : 4,
>                              ("may") : 5,
>                              ("jun", "june") : 6,
>                              ("jul", "july") : 7,
>                              ("aug", "august") : 8,
>                              ("sep", "september") : 9,
>                              ("oct", "october"): 10,
>                              ("nov", "november"): 11,
>                              ("dec", "december"): 12
>                              }
>                try:
>                        month = int(month)
>                except ValueError:
>                        for eachKey in month_dict.keys():
>                                if month.lower() in eachKey:
>                                        month = month_dict[eachKey]
>                                else:
>                                        month = ""
>                if month=="" or day=="" or year=="":
>                        self.date =  time.localtime()
>                else:
>                        self.date = (int(year), month, int(day), 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, -1)
>
>        def display(self, format_indicator = None):
>                if format_indicator == 'MDY':
>                        print time.strftime("%m/%d/%y",self.date)
>                elif format_indicator == 'MDYY':
>                        print time.strftime("%m/%d/%Y",self.date)
>                elif format_indicator == 'DMY':
>                        print time.strftime("%d/%m/%y",self.date)
>                elif format_indicator == 'DMYY':
>                        print time.strftime("%d/%m/%Y",self.date)
>                elif format_indicator == 'MODYY':
>                        print time.strftime("%b %d, %Y",self.date)
>                else:
>                        print time.strftime("%a %b %d %Y",self.date)
>
>
> if __name__ == "__main__":
>        print "Welcome to the Date Formatter!"
>        month = raw_input("Please enter a month: ")
>        day = raw_input("Please enter a day: ")
>        year = raw_input("Please enter a year: ")
>        date_obj = date_format(month, day, year)
>        format_indicator = raw_input("Enter a format indicator: ")
>        date_obj.display(format_indicator.upper())
>
> I am having trouble dealing with the case where the user actually types in a month's name instead of the number:
> io at io-station-1 ./chap13 180> python date_format_v01.py
>
> Welcome to the Date Formatter!
> Please enter a month (as a number): Oct
> Please enter a day: 31
> Please enter a year: 1976
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>  File "date_format_v01.py", line 53, in ?
>    date_obj = date_format(month, day, year)
>  File "date_format_v01.py", line 24, in __init__
>    if month.lower() in eachKey:
> AttributeError: 'int' object has no attribute 'lower'
>
> Any suggestions?
> -Chris

wrap the call to  month.lower() in a try/except block.

try:
    if month.lower() .....
except AttributeError:
   process this as a string instead of a number....


-- 
Stand Fast,
tjg.  [Timothy Grant]