anybox.testing.datetime 0.4.2

Usage

Before anything, the package must be imported in order to replace the regular datetime module with the modified one:

>>> import anybox.testing.datetime
>>> from datetime import datetime
>>> import time

Let’s keep the real value of now around:

>>> start = datetime.now()
>>> start_t = time.time()

Then you can change the current time:

>>> datetime.set_now(datetime(2001, 01, 01, 3, 57, 0))
>>> datetime.now()
datetime(2001, 1, 1, 3, 57)
>>> datetime.today()
datetime(2001, 1, 1, 3, 57)

The time module goes along:

>>> datetime.fromtimestamp(time.time())
datetime(2001, 1, 1, 3, 57)

Note that you can expect a few microseconds difference (not displayed here because datetime.fromtimestamp ignores them).

Don’t forget afterwards to get back to the regular system clock, otherwise many pieces of code might get very suprised if the system clock looks as if it’s frozen:

>>> datetime.real_now()

Now let’s check it worked:

>>> now = datetime.now()
>>> now > start
True
>>> from datetime import timedelta
>>> now - start < timedelta(0, 0, 10000) # 10 ms
True

And with the time module:

>>> now_t = time.time()
>>> now_t > start_t
True
>>> now_t - start_t < 0.01 # 10 ms again
True

Other constructors are still available (this is a non regression test):

>>> import datetime
>>> datetime.time(3, 57, 0)
datetime.time(3, 57)
>>> datetime.datetime(2013, 1, 1, 3, 57, 0)
datetime(2013, 1, 1, 3, 57)
>>> datetime.date(2013, 1, 1)
datetime.date(2013, 1, 1)

Behind the hood

Our replacement class is the one loaded from the datetime module, but instances of the original datetime class behave exactly as instances of our datetime.datetime. This is needed because most computational methods, actually return an object of the original datetime class. This works with python >= 2.6 only.

First let’s check that our class is a subclass of the original one. If this fails, this test does not mean anything anymore:

>>> datetime.datetime is datetime.original_datetime
False
>>> issubclass(datetime.datetime, datetime.original_datetime)
True

Then let’s demonstrate the behaviour:

>>> odt = datetime.original_datetime(2012, 1, 1)
>>> isinstance(odt, datetime.datetime)
True
>>> issubclass(datetime.original_datetime, datetime.datetime)
True

We’ll need a tzinfo subclass from now on.

>>> from datetime import tzinfo
>>> class mytzinfo(tzinfo):
...     def utcoffset(self, dt):
...         return timedelta(hours=2)
...     def dst(self, dt):
...         return timedelta(0)

Compatibility

Over the lifespan of this development toolkit module, we’ve had to ensure compatibility with several subsystems

>>> import sqlite3
>>> cnx = sqlite3.connect(':memory:')
>>> cr = cnx.cursor()
>>> cr = cr.execute("CREATE TABLE dates (dt text, d text)")
>>> dt = datetime.datetime(2013, 1, 25, 12, 34, 0)
>>> d = datetime.date(2013, 4, 7)
>>> cr = cr.execute("INSERT INTO dates VALUES (?, ?)", (dt, d))
>>> cr = cr.execute("SELECT dt, d from dates")
>>> cr.fetchall()
[(u'2013-01-25 12:34:00', u'2013-04-07')]

>>> dt = datetime.datetime.now()
>>> isinstance(dt, datetime.original_datetime)
True
>>> d = datetime.date.today()
>>> cr = cr.execute("INSERT INTO dates VALUES (?, ?)", (dt, d))
>>> cr = cr.execute("SELECT dt, d from dates")
>>> res = cr.fetchall() # can't check the value, it changes a lot !

Test

This README is also a doctest. To it and other doctests for this package, simply do:

nosetests --with-doctest --doctest-extension=txt

Changes