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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-19T06:13:24+00:00

Okay, so I’m trying to get two variables. One with yesterday’s date, one with

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Okay, so I’m trying to get two variables. One with yesterday’s date, one with a date six days from today. This is so I can query google calendar for events happening this week.
I’m building a date time object, setting the date to today, then trying to store the values in two new variables. However, when I set the second variable, the first is getting modified as well. It appears to be assigning the variables by a reference to the object instead of the value I’m trying to stick into it.

$todayData = explode("-", date("Y-m-d", Time()));
//Get DateTime for Yesterday
$today = new DateTime();
$today->setDate($todayData[0], $todayData[1], $todayData[2]);
echo $today->format("Y-m-d");
echo "<br />";
//Yesterday
$startDate = $today->modify("-1 day");
echo $startDate->format("Y-m-d");
echo "<br />";
//End of the week
$endDate = $today->modify("+6 day");
echo $endDate->format("Y-m-d");
echo "<br />";

//recheck yesterday
echo $startDate->format("Y-m-d");
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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    When you modify $today, you’re modifying a reference to a newly created object. In turn, since $startDate and $endDate both reference $today, they are viewing the same object.

    One solution is to return a new DateTime object each time you call the modify() method I assume you’ve created. This would then allow you to have a brand new date every time modify() is used, but then this wouldn’t really modify the original DateTime object.

    Another option is to use cloning in your object. This makes a new object with the same value as the object you’re duplicating. See here: http://php.net/manual/en/language.oop5.cloning.php

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