Random time and date between 2 date values - php

Question

I'm trying to write a php script (or line of code) to echo a random time and date between 2 dates, eg
2012-12-24 13:03
which would be between my chosen dates of 1st October 2012 and 1st Jan 2013.
Any ideas how best to do this? Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Easy :) Just choose 2 random dates, convert to EPOCH, and random between these 2 values :)
EPOCH - The time since 1/1/1970, in seconds.
You can use the strtotime() function to make date-strings turn into epoch time, and the date() function to make it the other way back.
function rand_date($min_date, $max_date) {
/* Gets 2 dates as string, earlier and later date.
Returns date in between them.
*/
$min_epoch = strtotime($min_date);
$max_epoch = strtotime($max_date);
$rand_epoch = rand($min_epoch, $max_epoch);
return date('Y-m-d H:i:s', $rand_epoch);
}

Answer 2

You probably want to define a resolution, for example one minute, or three minutes or 15 seconds or one and a half day or what not. The randomness should be applied on the whole period, I've choosen one minute here for exemplary purposes (there are 132480 minutes in your period).
$start = new Datetime('1st October 2012');
$end = new Datetime('1st Jan 2013');
$interval = new DateInterval('PT1M'); // Resolution: 1 Minute
$period = new DatePeriod($start, $interval, $end);
$random = new RandomIterator($period);
list($result) = iterator_to_array($random, false) ? : [null];
This for example gives:
class DateTime#7 (3) {
public $date =>
string(19) "2012-10-16 02:06:00"
public $timezone_type =>
int(3)
public $timezone =>
string(13) "Europe/Berlin"
}
You can find the RandomIterator here. Without it, it will take a little longer (ca. 1.5 the number of iterations compared to the example above) using:
$count = iterator_count($period);
$random = rand(1, $count);
$limited = new LimitIterator(new IteratorIterator($period), $random - 1, 1);
$limited->rewind();
$result = $limited->current();
I also tried with seconds, but that would take quite long. You probably want first to find a random day (92 days), and then some random time in it.
Also I've run some tests and I could not find any benefit in using DatePeriod so far as long as you're on common resolutions like seconds:
$start = new Datetime('1st October 2012');
$end = new Datetime('1st Jan 2013');
$random = new DateTime('#' . mt_rand($start->getTimestamp(), $end->getTimestamp()));
or minutes:
/**
* #param DateTime $start
* #param DateTime $end
* #param int|DateInterval $resolution in Seconds or as DateInterval
* #return DateTime
*/
$randomTime = function (DateTime $start, DateTime $end, $resolution = 1) {
if ($resolution instanceof DateInterval) {
$interval = $resolution;
$resolution = ($interval->m * 2.62974e6 + $interval->d) * 86400 + $interval->h * 60 + $interval->s;
}
$startValue = floor($start->getTimestamp() / $resolution);
$endValue = ceil($end->getTimestamp() / $resolution);
$random = mt_rand($startValue, $endValue) * $resolution;
return new DateTime('#' . $random);
};
$random = $randomTime($start, $end, 60);

Answer 3

Assuming you want to include October 1st, but not include Jan 1st...
$start = strtotime("2012-10-01 00:00:00");
$end = strtotime("2012-12-31 23:59:59");
$randomDate = date("Y-m-d H:i:s", rand($start, $end));
echo $randomDate;

Answer 4

so crazy it just may worK
function randomDate($start_date, $end_date)
{
//make timetamps
$min = strtotime($start_date);
$max = strtotime($end_date);
//random date
$rand_date = rand($min, $max);
//format it
return date('Y-m-d H:i:s', $rand_date);
}

Answer 5

Here's some code to accomplish this:
$randDate=date('Y-m-d', mt_rand(strtotime('2012-10-01'), strtotime('2013-01-01')));

Answer 6

Okay, here's something
$date_start = strtotime('1 October 2012');
$date_end = strtotime('1 January 2013');
$rand_date = rand($date_start, $date_end);
echo(date('d.m.Y H:i', $rand_date));