Changing Format of Date Field in ArcMap Field Calculator?

Question

I am trying to change the format of date field using ArcMap field calculator.

My data is currently in the format "%d/%m/%Y %h:%m:%s" (e.g. 5/05/2016 12:25:46 AM)

I want to change this to "%d/%m/%Y" (e.g. 5/05/2016). No time data.

I have been trying to use the following, but this does not work.

datetime.strptime( !DateField!, "%d/%m/%Y)

I have looked at several similar questions posted, but none seem to do this?

Python or VBScript is ok, using ArcGIS 10.3

• PolyGeo: Was this one of the "several similar questions posted" that you looked at? gis.stackexchange.com/questions/165892/…

Answer 1

The dates are stored as strings (to be precise, unicode) meaning that you need to construct a true Python datetime object and then manipulate it.

If my date field MyDate is 2017年08月09日 08:51:32, then I'd use this snippet

str(datetime.datetime.strptime(!MyDate!, "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S").date()) to get 2017年08月09日.

If your date is 5/05/2016 12:25:46 AM, you would need to use

str(datetime.datetime.strptime(s, "%d/%m/%Y %H:%M:%S %p").date()) to get 5/05/2016

Answer 2

No need for python, just use the Convert Time Field tool!