Question

I’m converting a string into time object in python 2.4.

d1 = time.strptime(d2, '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S.%%')

Here d2 is '2012-11-07 13:41:13.138807'

I’m getting the following error.

ValueError: time data did not match format:  data=2012-11-07 13:41:13.138807  fmt=%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S.%%

Any solution?

Answer 1

Try adding .%f to your string (Python 2.6+), which should handle the value (although it does not appear to be stored):

In [5]: import time

In [6]: d2 = '2012-11-07 13:41:13.138807'

In [7]: d1 = time.strptime(d2, '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S.%f')

In [8]: d1
Out[8]: time.struct_time(tm_year=2012, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=7, tm_hour=13, tm_min=41, tm_sec=13, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=312, tm_isdst=-1)

The solution from @bradleyayers will accurately capture your microsecond value if needed, so if you need that, I would suggest using his way 🙂

Since the %f parameter for datetime/time isn’t available pre-2.6, and if you don’t need to capture the microseconds, you can try something like this (rough idea that splits on the period and takes the first element – could likely be optimized):

In [20]: import time

In [21]: d2 = '2012-11-07 13:41:13.138807'

In [22]: d2_noms = d2.split('.')[0]

In [23]: d1 = time.strptime(d2_noms, '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S')

In [24]: d1
Out[24]: time.struct_time(tm_year=2012, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=7, tm_hour=13, tm_min=41, tm_sec=13, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=312, tm_isdst=-1)