Converting epoch time to "real" date/time - c++

Question

What I want to do is convert an epoch time (seconds since midnight 1/1/1970) to "real" time (m/d/y h:m:s)
So far, I have the following algorithm, which to me feels a bit ugly:
void DateTime::splitTicks(time_t time) {
seconds = time % 60;
time /= 60;
minutes = time % 60;
time /= 60;
hours = time % 24;
time /= 24;
year = DateTime::reduceDaysToYear(time);
month = DateTime::reduceDaysToMonths(time,year);
day = int(time);
}
int DateTime::reduceDaysToYear(time_t &days) {
int year;
for (year=1970;days>daysInYear(year);year++) {
days -= daysInYear(year);
}
return year;
}
int DateTime::reduceDaysToMonths(time_t &days,int year) {
int month;
for (month=0;days>daysInMonth(month,year);month++)
days -= daysInMonth(month,year);
return month;
}
you can assume that the members seconds, minutes, hours, month, day, and year all exist.
Using the for loops to modify the original time feels a little off, and I was wondering if there is a "better" solution to this.

Answer 1

Be careful about leap years in your daysInMonth function.
If you want very high performance, you can precompute the pair to get to month+year in one step, and then calculate the day/hour/min/sec.
A good solution is the one in the gmtime source code:
/*
* gmtime - convert the calendar time into broken down time
*/
/* $Header: gmtime.c,v 1.4 91/04/22 13:20:27 ceriel Exp $ */
#include <time.h>
#include <limits.h>
#include "loc_time.h"
struct tm *
gmtime(register const time_t *timer)
{
static struct tm br_time;
register struct tm *timep = &br_time;
time_t time = *timer;
register unsigned long dayclock, dayno;
int year = EPOCH_YR;
dayclock = (unsigned long)time % SECS_DAY;
dayno = (unsigned long)time / SECS_DAY;
timep->tm_sec = dayclock % 60;
timep->tm_min = (dayclock % 3600) / 60;
timep->tm_hour = dayclock / 3600;
timep->tm_wday = (dayno + 4) % 7; /* day 0 was a thursday */
while (dayno >= YEARSIZE(year)) {
dayno -= YEARSIZE(year);
year++;
}
timep->tm_year = year - YEAR0;
timep->tm_yday = dayno;
timep->tm_mon = 0;
while (dayno >= _ytab[LEAPYEAR(year)][timep->tm_mon]) {
dayno -= _ytab[LEAPYEAR(year)][timep->tm_mon];
timep->tm_mon++;
}
timep->tm_mday = dayno + 1;
timep->tm_isdst = 0;
return timep;
}

Answer 2

The standard library provides functions for doing this. gmtime() or localtime() will convert a time_t (seconds since the epoch, i.e.- Jan 1 1970 00:00:00) into a struct tm. strftime() can then be used to convert a struct tm into a string (char*) based on the format you specify.
see: http://www.cplusplus.com/reference/clibrary/ctime/
Date/time calculations can get tricky. You are much better off using an existing solution rather than trying to roll your own, unless you have a really good reason.

Answer 3

An easy way (though different than the format you wanted):
std::time_t result = std::time(nullptr);
std::cout << std::asctime(std::localtime(&result));
Output:
Wed Sep 21 10:27:52 2011
Notice that the returned result will be automatically concatenated with "\n".. you can remove it using:
std::string::size_type i = res.find("\n");
if (i != std::string::npos)
res.erase(i, res.length());
Taken from: http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/chrono/c/time

Answer 4

time_t t = unixTime;
cout << ctime(&t) << endl;

Answer 5

This code might help you.
#include <iostream>
#include <ctime>
using namespace std;
int main() {
// current date/time based on current system
time_t now = time(0);
// convert now to string form
char* dt = ctime(&now);
cout << "The local date and time is: " << dt << endl;
// convert now to tm struct for UTC
tm *gmtm = gmtime(&now);
dt = asctime(gmtm);
cout << "The UTC date and time is:"<< dt << endl;
}

Answer 6

To convert a epoch string to UTC
string epoch_to_utc(string epoch) {
long temp = stol(epoch);
const time_t old = (time_t)temp;
struct tm *oldt = gmtime(&old);
return asctime(oldt);
}
and then it can be called as
string temp = "245446047";
cout << epoch_to_utc(temp);
outputs:
Tue Oct 11 19:27:27 1977

Answer 7

If your original time type is time_t, you have to use functions from time.h i.e. gmtime etc. to get portable code. The C/C++ standards do not specify internal format (or even exact type) for the time_t, so you cannot directly convert or manipulate time_t values.
All that is known is that time_t is "arithmetic type", but results of arithmetic operations are not specified - you cannot even add/subtract reliably. In practice, many systems use integer type for time_t with internal format of seconds since epoch, but this is not enforced by standards.
In short, use gmtime (and time.h functionality in general).