[samlab]

I am Using C. ok, heres my problem. i have two strings that are in the format: mm/dd/yyyy hh:mm:ss . i need to subtract one from the other and get an acurate result. after looking through the time.h library i came across diftime(t_time, t_time). so to use this i need to convert my string to either a type t_time; or convert it to type tm then to t_time. does anyone know how to do this? is there an easier way to do what i am trying to do?

i tryed to convert from the string to all integers and then to the tm pointer like this:
(NOTE: out_hour, out_min, out_sec, etc. are holding the appropriate strings)

int outhour, outmin, outsec, inhour, inmin, insec, outday, outmonth, outyear, inday, inmonth, inyear;

tm *out_timeptr, *in_timeptr;

outhour = atoi(out_hour);
outmin = atoi(out_min);
outsec = atoi(out_sec);
inhour = atoi(in_hour);
inmin = atoi(in_min);
insec = atoi(in_sec);
inday = atoi(in_day);
inmonth = atoi(in_month);
inyear = atoi(in_year);
outday = atoi(out_day);
outmonth = atoi(out_month);
outyear = atoi(out_year);

in_timeptr.tm_sec = insec;
in_timeptr.tm_min = inmin;
in_timeptr.tm_hour = inhour;
in_timeptr.tm_mday = inday;
in_timeptr.tm_mon = inmonth;
in_timeptr.tm_year = inyear;
out_timeptr.tm_sec = outsec;
out_timeptr.tm_min = outmin;
out_timeptr.tm_hour = outhour;
out_timeptr.tm_mday = outday;
out_timeptr.tm_mon = outmonth;
out_timeptr.tm_year = outyear;

when i try to assign to the tm pointers i get errors: must have class/struct/union type
thanks for any help

[samlab]

ok, i tryed changing it to:

in_timeptr->tm_sec = insec;
in_timeptr->tm_min = inmin;
in_timeptr->tm_hour = inhour;
in_timeptr->tm_mday = inday;
in_timeptr->tm_mon = inmonth;
in_timeptr->tm_year = inyear;
out_timeptr->tm_sec = outsec;
out_timeptr->tm_min = outmin;
out_timeptr->tm_hour = outhour;
out_timeptr->tm_mday = outday;
out_timeptr->tm_mon = outmonth;
out_timeptr->tm_year = outyear;

/* convert from tm to time_t */
out_time = mktime(out_timeptr);
in_time = mktime(in_timeptr);

now it compiles, but i get a runtime error as soon as i get to the first line of this -- acces violation

:(

[Scorpions4ever]

Bet you didn't initialize in_timeptr or out_timeptr :)

[samlab]

woops sorry heres my initilizations

struct tm *out_timeptr, *in_timeptr;
time_t out_time, in_time;

[Scorpions4ever]

Like I said, you haven't initialized (i.e. set the pointer values) of outtime_ptr and intime_ptr. It is not sufficient to merely declare the variables. You must point them somewhere. However, instead of using pointers, just declare variables of type struct tm and set the values like this:

time_t out_time, in_time;
struct tm invar, outvar;

invar.tm_sec = insec;
invar.tm_min = inmin;
..
..
outvar.tm_year = tmyear;

intime = mktime(&invar);
outtime = mktime(&outvar);

[samlab]

:D Awsome! thank you. I didnt see that