Date::Calc(images) - phpMan

Date::Calc(3)         User Contributed Perl Documentation        Date::Calc(3)

NAME
       Date::Calc - Gregorian calendar date calculations
MOTTO
       Keep it small, fast and simple
PREFACE
       This package consists of a C library and a Perl module (which uses the
       C library, internally) for all kinds of date calculations based on the
       Gregorian calendar (the one used in all western countries today),
       thereby complying with all relevant norms and standards:
       ISO/R 2015-1971, DIN 1355 and, to some extent, ISO 8601 (where
       applicable).
       (See also http://www.engelschall.com/u/sb/download/Date-Calc/DIN1355/
       for a scan of part of the "DIN 1355" document (in German)).
       The module of course handles year numbers of 2000 and above correctly
       ("Year 2000" or "Y2K" compliance) -- actually all year numbers from 1
       to the largest positive integer representable on your system (which is
       at least 32767) can be dealt with.
       This is not true, however, for the import/export functions in this
       package which are an interface to the internal POSIX date and time
       functions of your system, which can only cover dates in the following
       ranges:
        01-Jan-1970 00:00:00 GMT .. 19-Jan-2038 03:14:07 GMT [Unix etc.]
        01-Jan-1904 00:00:00 LT  .. 06-Feb-2040 06:28:15 LT  [MacOS Classic]
        (LT = local time)
       Note that this package projects the Gregorian calendar back until the
       year 1 A.D. -- even though the Gregorian calendar was only adopted in
       1582, mostly by the Catholic European countries, in obedience to the
       corresponding decree of Pope Gregory XIII in that year.
       Some (mainly protestant) countries continued to use the Julian calendar
       (used until then) until as late as the beginning of the 20th century.
       Finally, note that this package is not intended to do everything you
       could ever imagine automagically for you; it is rather intended to
       serve as a toolbox (in the best of UNIX spirit and traditions) which
       should, however, always get you where you want to go.
       See the section "RECIPES" at the bottom of this document for solutions
       to common problems!
       If nevertheless you can't figure out how to solve a particular problem,
       please let me know! (See e-mail address at the end of this document.)
SYNOPSIS
         use Date::Calc qw(
             Days_in_Year
             Days_in_Month
             Weeks_in_Year
             leap_year
             check_date
             check_time
             check_business_date
             Day_of_Year
             Date_to_Days
             Day_of_Week
             Week_Number
             Week_of_Year
             Monday_of_Week
             Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year
             Standard_to_Business
             Business_to_Standard
             Delta_Days
             Delta_DHMS
             Delta_YMD
             Delta_YMDHMS
             N_Delta_YMD
             N_Delta_YMDHMS
             Normalize_DHMS
             Add_Delta_Days
             Add_Delta_DHMS
             Add_Delta_YM
             Add_Delta_YMD
             Add_Delta_YMDHMS
             Add_N_Delta_YMD
             Add_N_Delta_YMDHMS
             System_Clock
             Today
             Now
             Today_and_Now
             This_Year
             Gmtime
             Localtime
             Mktime
             Timezone
             Date_to_Time
             Time_to_Date
             Easter_Sunday
             Decode_Month
             Decode_Day_of_Week
             Decode_Language
             Decode_Date_EU
             Decode_Date_US
             Fixed_Window
             Moving_Window
             Compress
             Uncompress
             check_compressed
             Compressed_to_Text
             Date_to_Text
             Date_to_Text_Long
             English_Ordinal
             Calendar
             Month_to_Text
             Day_of_Week_to_Text
             Day_of_Week_Abbreviation
             Language_to_Text
             Language
             Languages
             Decode_Date_EU2
             Decode_Date_US2
             Parse_Date
             ISO_LC
             ISO_UC
         );
         use Date::Calc qw(:all);
         Days_in_Year
             $days = Days_in_Year($year,$month);
         Days_in_Month
             $days = Days_in_Month($year,$month);
         Weeks_in_Year
             $weeks = Weeks_in_Year($year);
         leap_year
             if (leap_year($year))
         check_date
             if (check_date($year,$month,$day))
         check_time
             if (check_time($hour,$min,$sec))
         check_business_date
             if (check_business_date($year,$week,$dow))
         Day_of_Year
             $doy = Day_of_Year($year,$month,$day);
         Date_to_Days
             $days = Date_to_Days($year,$month,$day);
         Day_of_Week
             $dow = Day_of_Week($year,$month,$day);
         Week_Number
             $week = Week_Number($year,$month,$day);          # DEPRECATED
         Week_of_Year
             ($week,$year) = Week_of_Year($year,$month,$day); # RECOMMENDED
             $week = Week_of_Year($year,$month,$day);         # DANGEROUS
         Monday_of_Week
             ($year,$month,$day) = Monday_of_Week($week,$year);
         Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year
             if (($year,$month,$day) =
             Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year($year,$month,$dow,$n))
         Standard_to_Business
             ($year,$week,$dow) =
             Standard_to_Business($year,$month,$day);
         Business_to_Standard
             ($year,$month,$day) =
             Business_to_Standard($year,$week,$dow);
         Delta_Days
             $Dd = Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1,
                              $year2,$month2,$day2);
         Delta_DHMS
             ($Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds) =
             Delta_DHMS($year1,$month1,$day1, $hour1,$min1,$sec1,
                        $year2,$month2,$day2, $hour2,$min2,$sec2);
         Delta_YMD
             ($Dy,$Dm,$Dd) =
             Delta_YMD($year1,$month1,$day1,
                       $year2,$month2,$day2);
         Delta_YMDHMS
             ($D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dh,$Dm,$Ds) =
             Delta_YMDHMS($year1,$month1,$day1, $hour1,$min1,$sec1,
                          $year2,$month2,$day2, $hour2,$min2,$sec2);
         N_Delta_YMD
             ($Dy,$Dm,$Dd) =
             N_Delta_YMD($year1,$month1,$day1,
                         $year2,$month2,$day2);
         N_Delta_YMDHMS
             ($D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dhh,$Dmm,$Dss) =
             N_Delta_YMDHMS($year1,$month1,$day1, $hour1,$min1,$sec1,
                            $year2,$month2,$day2, $hour2,$min2,$sec2);
         Normalize_DHMS
             ($Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds) =
             Normalize_DHMS($Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds);
         Add_Delta_Days
             ($year,$month,$day) =
             Add_Delta_Days($year,$month,$day,
                            $Dd);
         Add_Delta_DHMS
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) =
             Add_Delta_DHMS($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec,
                            $Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds);
         Add_Delta_YM
             ($year,$month,$day) =
             Add_Delta_YM($year,$month,$day,
                          $Dy,$Dm);
         Add_Delta_YMD
             ($year,$month,$day) =
             Add_Delta_YMD($year,$month,$day,
                           $Dy,$Dm,$Dd);
         Add_Delta_YMDHMS
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) =
             Add_Delta_YMDHMS($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec,
                              $D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dh,$Dm,$Ds);
         Add_N_Delta_YMD
             ($year,$month,$day) =
             Add_N_Delta_YMD($year,$month,$day,
                             $Dy,$Dm,$Dd);
         Add_N_Delta_YMDHMS
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) =
             Add_N_Delta_YMDHMS($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec,
                                $D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dhh,$Dmm,$Dss);
         System_Clock
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $doy,$dow,$dst) =
             System_Clock([$gmt]);
         Today
             ($year,$month,$day) = Today([$gmt]);
         Now
             ($hour,$min,$sec) = Now([$gmt]);
         Today_and_Now
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) = Today_and_Now([$gmt]);
         This_Year
             $year = This_Year([$gmt]);
         Gmtime
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $doy,$dow,$dst) =
             Gmtime([time]);
         Localtime
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $doy,$dow,$dst) =
             Localtime([time]);
         Mktime
             $time = Mktime($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec);
         Timezone
             ($D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dh,$Dm,$Ds, $dst) = Timezone([time]);
         Date_to_Time
             $time = Date_to_Time($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec);
         Time_to_Date
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) = Time_to_Date([time]);
         Easter_Sunday
             ($year,$month,$day) = Easter_Sunday($year);
         Decode_Month
             if ($month = Decode_Month($string[,$lang]))
         Decode_Day_of_Week
             if ($dow = Decode_Day_of_Week($string[,$lang]))
         Decode_Language
             if ($lang = Decode_Language($string))
         Decode_Date_EU
             if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_EU($string[,$lang]))
         Decode_Date_US
             if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_US($string[,$lang]))
         Fixed_Window
             $year = Fixed_Window($yy);
         Moving_Window
             $year = Moving_Window($yy);
         Compress
             $date = Compress($year,$month,$day);
         Uncompress
             if (($century,$year,$month,$day) = Uncompress($date))
         check_compressed
             if (check_compressed($date))
         Compressed_to_Text
             $string = Compressed_to_Text($date[,$lang]);
         Date_to_Text
             $string = Date_to_Text($year,$month,$day[,$lang]);
         Date_to_Text_Long
             $string = Date_to_Text_Long($year,$month,$day[,$lang]);
         English_Ordinal
             $string = English_Ordinal($number);
         Calendar
             $string = Calendar($year,$month[,$orthodox[,$lang]]);
         Month_to_Text
             $string = Month_to_Text($month[,$lang]);
         Day_of_Week_to_Text
             $string = Day_of_Week_to_Text($dow[,$lang]);
         Day_of_Week_Abbreviation
             $string = Day_of_Week_Abbreviation($dow[,$lang]);
         Language_to_Text
             $string = Language_to_Text($lang);
         Language
             $lang = Language();
             Language($lang);               # DEPRECATED
             $oldlang = Language($newlang); # DEPRECATED
         Languages
             $max_lang = Languages();
         Decode_Date_EU2
             if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_EU2($string[,$lang]))
         Decode_Date_US2
             if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_US2($string[,$lang]))
         Parse_Date
             if (($year,$month,$day) = Parse_Date($string[,$lang]))
         ISO_LC
             $lower = ISO_LC($string);
         ISO_UC
             $upper = ISO_UC($string);
         Version
             $string = Date::Calc::Version();
IMPORTANT NOTES
       (See the section "RECIPES" at the bottom of this document for solutions
       to common problems!)
       o "Year 2000" ("Y2K") compliance
         The upper limit for any year number in this module is only given by
         the size of the largest positive integer that can be represented in a
         variable of the C type "int" on your system, which is at least 32767,
         according to the ANSI C standard (exceptions see below).
         In order to simplify calculations, this module projects the gregorian
         calendar back until the year 1 A.D. -- i.e., back BEYOND the year
         1582 when this calendar was first decreed by the Catholic Pope
         Gregory XIII!
         Therefore, BE SURE TO ALWAYS SPECIFY "1998" WHEN YOU MEAN "1998", for
         instance, and DO NOT WRITE "98" INSTEAD, because this will in fact
         perform a calculation based on the year "98" A.D. and NOT "1998"!
         An exception from this rule are the functions which contain the word
         "compress" in their names (which can only handle years between 1970
         and 2069 and also accept the abbreviations "00" to "99"), and the
         functions whose names begin with "Decode_Date_" (which translate year
         numbers below 100 using a technique known as "moving window").
         If you want to convert a two-digit year number into a full-fledged,
         four-digit (at least for some years to come ";-)") year number, use
         the two functions "Fixed_Window()" and "Moving_Window()" (see their
         description further below).
         Note also that the following import/export functions (which are
         interfaces to the POSIX functions "time()", "gmtime()", "localtime()"
         and "mktime()" or (the last two) substitutes for the BSD function
         "timegm()" and the POSIX function "gmtime()") have a very limited
         range of representable dates (in contrast to all other functions in
         this package, which cover virtually any date including and after
         January 1st 1 A.D.):
                       System_Clock()
                       Today()
                       Now()
                       Today_and_Now()
                       This_Year()
                       Gmtime()
                       Localtime()
                       Mktime()
                       Timezone()
                       Date_to_Time()
                       Time_to_Date()
         These functions can only deal with dates in the range from
         01-Jan-1970 00:00:00 GMT to 19-Jan-2038 03:14:07 GMT (the latter
         limit is only authoritative on 32 bit systems, however, and can (in
         principle, through a few code changes) be extended somewhat ":-)" on
         64 bit systems).
         On MacOS Classic, the valid range of dates is between (both included)
         01-Jan-1904 00:00:00 (local time) to 06-Feb-2040 06:28:15 (local
         time).
         Note further that the function "Easter_Sunday()" can only be used for
         years in the range 1583 to 2299.
       o POSIX functions
         Note that the following functions
                       Gmtime()
                       Localtime()
                       Mktime()
                       Timezone()
         are actually wrappers around or based upon the corresponding POSIX
         functions "time()", "gmtime()", "localtime()" and "mktime()".
         As such, they depend on local settings of the underlying machine such
         as e.g. the system clock, the time zone and the locale.
         Their results can therefore sometimes be unexpected or counter-
         intuitive.
         Therefore, no support can be provided for these functions.
         They are supplied "as is", purely for the sake of interoperability.
         Use at your own risk. (You have been warned!)
       o First index
         ALL ranges in this module start with "1", NOT "0"!
         I.e., the day of month, day of week, day of year, month of year, week
         of year, first valid year number and language ALL start counting at
         one, NOT zero!
         The only exception is the function ""Week_Number()"", which may in
         fact return "0" when the given date actually lies in the last week of
         the PREVIOUS year, and of course the numbers for hours (0..23),
         minutes (0..59) and seconds (0..59).
       o Function naming conventions
         Function names completely in lower case indicate a boolean return
         value.
       o Boolean values
         Boolean values returned from functions in this module are always a
         numeric zero ("0") for "false" and a numeric one ("1") for "true".
       o Exception handling
         The functions in this module will usually die with a corresponding
         error message if their input parameters, intermediate results or
         output values are out of range.
         The following functions handle errors differently:
           -  check_date()
           -  check_time()
           -  check_business_date()
           -  check_compressed()
         (which return a "false" return value when the given input does not
         represent a valid date or time),
           -  Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year()
         (which returns an empty list if the requested 5th day of week does
         not exist),
           -  Decode_Month()
           -  Decode_Day_of_Week()
           -  Decode_Language()
           -  Fixed_Window()
           -  Moving_Window()
           -  Compress()
         (which return "0" upon failure or invalid input), and
           -  Decode_Date_EU()
           -  Decode_Date_US()
           -  Decode_Date_EU2()
           -  Decode_Date_US2()
           -  Parse_Date()
           -  Uncompress()
         (which return an empty list upon failure or invalid input).
         Note that you can always catch an exception thrown by any of the
         functions in this module and handle it yourself by enclosing the
         function call in an ""eval"" with curly brackets and checking the
         special variable "$@" (see "eval" in perlfunc(1) for details).
DESCRIPTION
       o "use Date::Calc qw( Days_in_Year Days_in_Month ... );"
       o "use Date::Calc qw(:all);"
         You can either specify the functions you want to import explicitly by
         enumerating them between the parentheses of the ""qw()"" operator, or
         you can use the "":all"" tag instead to import ALL available
         functions.
       o "$days = Days_in_Year($year,$month);"
         This function returns the sum of the number of days in the months
         starting with January up to and including "$month" in the given year
         "$year".
         I.e., ""Days_in_Year(1998,1)"" returns "31", ""Days_in_Year(1998,2)""
         returns "59", ""Days_in_Year(1998,3)"" returns "90", and so on.
         Note that ""Days_in_Year($year,12)"" returns the number of days in
         the given year "$year", i.e., either "365" or "366".
       o "$days = Days_in_Month($year,$month);"
         This function returns the number of days in the given month "$month"
         of the given year "$year".
         The year must always be supplied, even though it is only needed when
         the month is February, in order to determine whether it is a leap
         year or not.
         I.e., ""Days_in_Month(1998,1)"" returns "31",
         ""Days_in_Month(1998,2)"" returns "28", ""Days_in_Month(2000,2)""
         returns "29", ""Days_in_Month(1998,3)"" returns "31", and so on.
       o "$weeks = Weeks_in_Year($year);"
         This function returns the number of weeks in the given year "$year",
         i.e., either "52" or "53".
       o "if (leap_year($year))"
         This function returns "true" ("1") if the given year "$year" is a
         leap year and "false" ("0") otherwise.
       o "if (check_date($year,$month,$day))"
         This function returns "true" ("1") if the given three numerical
         values "$year", "$month" and "$day" constitute a valid date, and
         "false" ("0") otherwise.
       o "if (check_time($hour,$min,$sec))"
         This function returns "true" ("1") if the given three numerical
         values "$hour", "$min" and "$sec" constitute a valid time ("0 <=
         $hour < 24", "0 <= $min < 60" and "0 <= $sec < 60"), and "false"
         ("0") otherwise.
       o "if (check_business_date($year,$week,$dow))"
         This function returns "true" ("1") if the given three numerical
         values "$year", "$week" and "$dow" constitute a valid date in
         business format, and "false" ("0") otherwise.
         Beware that this function does NOT compute whether a given date is a
         business day (i.e., Monday to Friday)!
         To do so, use ""(Day_of_Week($year,$month,$day) < 6)"" instead.
       o "$doy = Day_of_Year($year,$month,$day);"
         This function returns the (relative) number of the day of the given
         date in the given year.
         E.g., ""Day_of_Year($year,1,1)"" returns "1",
         ""Day_of_Year($year,2,1)"" returns "32", and
         ""Day_of_Year($year,12,31)"" returns either "365" or "366".
         The day of year is sometimes also referred to as the Julian day (or
         date), although it has nothing to do with the Julian calendar, the
         calendar which was used before the Gregorian calendar.
         In order to convert the number returned by this function back into a
         date, use the function ""Add_Delta_Days()"" (described further
         below), as follows:
           $doy = Day_of_Year($year,$month,$day);
           ($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_Days($year,1,1, $doy - 1);
       o "$days = Date_to_Days($year,$month,$day);"
         This function returns the (absolute) number of the day of the given
         date, where counting starts at the 1st of January of the year 1 A.D.
         I.e., ""Date_to_Days(1,1,1)"" returns "1", ""Date_to_Days(1,12,31)""
         returns "365", ""Date_to_Days(2,1,1)"" returns "366",
         ""Date_to_Days(1998,5,1)"" returns "729510", and so on.
         This is sometimes also referred to (not quite correctly) as the
         Julian date (or day). This may cause confusion, because also the
         number of the day in a year (from 1 to 365 or 366) is frequently
         called the "Julian day".
         More confusing still, this has nothing to do with the Julian
         calendar, which was used BEFORE the Gregorian calendar.
         The Julian calendar was named after famous Julius Caesar, who had
         instituted it in Roman times. The Julian calendar is less precise
         than the Gregorian calendar because it has too many leap years
         compared to the true mean length of a year (but the Gregorian
         calendar also still has one day too much every 5000 years). Anyway,
         the Julian calendar was better than what existed before, because
         rulers had often changed the calendar used until then in arbitrary
         ways, in order to lengthen their own reign, for instance.
         In order to convert the number returned by this function back into a
         date, use the function ""Add_Delta_Days()"" (described further
         below), as follows:
           $days = Date_to_Days($year,$month,$day);
           ($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_Days(1,1,1, $days - 1);
       o "$dow = Day_of_Week($year,$month,$day);"
         This function returns the number of the day of week of the given
         date.
         The function returns "1" for Monday, "2" for Tuesday and so on until
         "7" for Sunday.
         Note that in the Hebrew calendar (on which the Christian calendar is
         based), the week starts with Sunday and ends with the Sabbath or
         Saturday (where according to the Genesis (as described in the Bible)
         the Lord rested from creating the world).
         In medieval times, Catholic Popes have decreed the Sunday to be the
         official day of rest, in order to dissociate the Christian from the
         Hebrew belief.
         It appears that this actually happened with the Emperor Constantin,
         who converted to Christianity but still worshipped the Sun god and
         therefore moved the Christian sabbath to the day of the Sun.
         Nowadays, the Sunday AND the Saturday are commonly considered (and
         used as) days of rest, usually referred to as the "week-end".
         Consistent with this practice, current norms and standards (such as
         ISO/R 2015-1971, DIN 1355 and ISO 8601) define the Monday as the
         first day of the week.
       o "$week = Week_Number($year,$month,$day);"
         This function returns the number of the week the given date lies in.
         If the given date lies in the LAST week of the PREVIOUS year, "0" is
         returned.
         If the given date lies in the FIRST week of the NEXT year,
         ""Weeks_in_Year($year) + 1"" is returned.
       o "($week,$year) = Week_of_Year($year,$month,$day);"
         This function returns the number of the week the given date lies in,
         as well as the year that week belongs to.
         I.e., if the given date lies in the LAST week of the PREVIOUS year,
         ""(Weeks_in_Year($year-1), $year-1)"" is returned.
         If the given date lies in the FIRST week of the NEXT year, ""(1,
         $year+1)"" is returned.
         Otherwise, ""(Week_Number($year,$month,$day), $year)"" is returned.
       o "$week = Week_of_Year($year,$month,$day);"
         In scalar context, this function returns just the week number. This
         allows you to write ""$week = Week_of_Year($year,$month,$day);""
         instead of ""($week) = Week_of_Year($year,$month,$day);"" (note the
         parentheses around "$week").
         If the given date lies in the LAST week of the PREVIOUS year,
         ""Weeks_in_Year($year-1)"" is returned.
         If the given date lies in the FIRST week of the NEXT year, "1" is
         returned.
         Otherwise the return value is identical with that of
         ""Week_Number($year,$month,$day)"".
         BEWARE that using this function in scalar context is a DANGEROUS
         feature, because without knowing which year the week belongs to, you
         might inadvertently assume the wrong one!
         If for instance you are iterating through an interval of dates, you
         might assume that the week always belongs to the same year as the
         given date, which unfortunately is WRONG in some cases!
         In many years, the 31st of December for instance belongs to week
         number one of the FOLLOWING year. Assuming that the year is the same
         as your date (31st of December, in this example), sends you back to
         the first week of the CURRENT year - the Monday of which, by the way,
         in case of bad luck, might actually lie in the year BEFORE the
         current year!
         This actually happens in 2002, for example.
         So you always need to provide the correct corresponding year number
         by other means, keeping track of it yourself.
         In case you do not understand this, never mind, but then simply DO
         NOT USE this function in scalar context!
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Monday_of_Week($week,$year);"
         This function returns the date of the first day of the given week,
         i.e., the Monday.
         "$year" must be greater than or equal to "1", and "$week" must lie in
         the range "1" to ""Weeks_in_Year($year)"".
         Note that you can write ""($year,$month,$day) =
         Monday_of_Week(Week_of_Year($year,$month,$day));"" in order to
         calculate the date of the Monday of the same week as the given date.
         If you want to calculate any other day of week in the same week as a
         given date, use
           @date = Add_Delta_Days(Monday_of_Week(Week_of_Year(@date)),$offset);
         where "$offset = 1" for Tuesday, 2 for Wednesday etc.
       o "if (($year,$month,$day) =
         Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year($year,$month,$dow,$n))"
         This function calculates the date of the "$n"th day of week "$dow" in
         the given month "$month" and year "$year"; such as, for example, the
         3rd Thursday of a given month and year.
         This can be used to send a notification mail to the members of a
         group which meets regularly on every 3rd Thursday of a month, for
         instance.
         (See the section "RECIPES" near the end of this document for a code
         snippet to actually do so.)
         "$year" must be greater than or equal to "1", "$month" must lie in
         the range "1" to "12", "$dow" must lie in the range "1" to "7" and
         "$n" must lie in the range "1" to "5", or a fatal error (with
         appropriate error message) occurs.
         The function returns an empty list when the 5th of a given day of
         week does not exist in the given month and year.
       o "($year,$week,$dow) = Standard_to_Business($year,$month,$day);"
         This function converts a given date from standard notation (year,
         month, day (of month)) to business notation (year, week, day of
         week).
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Business_to_Standard($year,$week,$dow);"
         This function converts a given date from business notation (year,
         week, day of week) to standard notation (year, month, day (of
         month)).
       o "$Dd = Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1, $year2,$month2,$day2);"
         This function returns the difference in days between the two given
         dates.
         The result is positive if the two dates are in chronological order,
         i.e., if date #1 comes chronologically BEFORE date #2, and negative
         if the order of the two dates is reversed.
         The result is zero if the two dates are identical.
       o "($Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds) = Delta_DHMS($year1,$month1,$day1,
         $hour1,$min1,$sec1, $year2,$month2,$day2, $hour2,$min2,$sec2);"
         This function returns the difference in days, hours, minutes and
         seconds between the two given dates with times.
         All four return values will be positive if the two dates are in
         chronological order, i.e., if date #1 comes chronologically BEFORE
         date #2, and negative (in all four return values!) if the order of
         the two dates is reversed.
         This is so that the two functions ""Delta_DHMS()"" and
         ""Add_Delta_DHMS()"" (description see further below) are
         complementary, i.e., mutually inverse:
           Add_Delta_DHMS(@date1,@time1, Delta_DHMS(@date1,@time1, @date2,@time2))
         yields ""(@date2,@time2)"" again, whereas
           Add_Delta_DHMS(@date2,@time2,
               map(-$_, Delta_DHMS(@date1,@time1, @date2,@time2)))
         yields ""(@date1,@time1)"", and
           Delta_DHMS(@date1,@time1, Add_Delta_DHMS(@date1,@time1, @delta))
         yields "@delta" again.
         The result is zero (in all four return values) if the two dates and
         times are identical.
       o "($Dy,$Dm,$Dd) = Delta_YMD($year1,$month1,$day1,
         $year2,$month2,$day2);"
         This function returns the vector
             ( $year2 - $year1, $month2 - $month1, $day2 - $day1 )
         This is called the "one-by-one" semantics.
         Adding the result of this function to the first date always yields
         the second date again, and adding the negative result (where the
         signs of all elements of the result vector have been flipped) to the
         second date gives the first date. See also the description of the
         function "Add_Delta_YMD()" further below.
         Example:
           (6,2,-30) == Delta_YMD(1996,1,31, 2002,3,1]);
           [1996,1,31] + ( 6, 2,-30) = [2002,3, 1]
           [2002,3, 1] + (-6,-2, 30) = [1996,1,31]
         An error occurs if any of the two given dates is invalid.
       o "($D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dh,$Dm,$Ds) = Delta_YMDHMS($year1,$month1,$day1,
         $hour1,$min1,$sec1, $year2,$month2,$day2, $hour2,$min2,$sec2);"
         This function is based on the function "Delta_YMD()" above but
         additionally calculates the time difference. When a carry over from
         the time difference occurs, the value of "$D_d" is adjusted
         accordingly, thus giving the correct total date/time difference.
         Arguments are expected to be in chronological order to yield a
         (usually) positive result.
         In any case, adding the result of this function to the first
         date/time value ("$year1,$month1,$day1," "$hour1,$min1,$sec1") always
         gives the second date/time value ("$year2,$month2,$day2,"
         "$hour2,$min2,$sec2") again, and adding the negative result (with the
         signs of all elements of the result vector flipped) to the second
         date/time value gives the first date/time value.
         See the function "Add_Delta_YMDHMS()" further below for adding a
         date/time value and a date/time difference.
         An error occurs if any of the given two date/time values is invalid.
       o "($Dy,$Dm,$Dd) = N_Delta_YMD($year1,$month1,$day1,
         $year2,$month2,$day2);"
         This function returns the difference between the two given dates in a
         more intuitive way (as far as possible - more on that see a bit
         further below) than the function "Delta_YMD()" described above.
         The "N" which precedes its name is meant to signify "new" or
         "normalized".
         This function is loosely based on recipe #17 b) (see the section
         "RECIPES" below near the end of this document).
         However, the code of recipe #17 b) actually does not treat positive
         and negative values symmetrically and consistently.
         This new routine does.
         The return values of this function are guaranteed to all have the
         same sign (or to be zero). This is why this function is called
         "normalized".
         Moreover, the results are guaranteed to be "minimal", in the sense
         that "|$Dm| < 12" and "|$Dd| < 31" (which is equivalent to $Dm lying
         in the range "[-11..+11]" and $Dd lying in the range "[-30..+30]").
         When the results are applied (i.e., added) to the first given date in
         a left-to-right order, the second given date is guaranteed to be
         obtained, provided that intermediary results are truncated, as done
         by the function "Add_Delta_YM()" (see further below), i.e., that
         invalid intermediate dates such as e.g. [2009,2,31] will
         automatically be transformed into [2009,2,28] (and not "wrapped" into
         the next month, e.g. to [2009,3,3]).
         This is called the "left-to-right with truncation" semantics.
         Note that reversing the order of the given dates and reversing the
         sign of each of the result values will not always add up.
         Consider the dates [2008,2,29] and [2009,2,1]: their difference is
         (0,11,3) ([2008,2,29] plus 11 months is [2009,1,29], which plus 3
         days is [2009,2,1]), but the difference between [2009,2,1] and
         [2008,2,29] is (0,-11,-1), and not (0,-11,-3) ([2009,2,1] minus 11
         months is [2008,3,1], which minus one day is [2008,2,29]).
         Another example: The difference between [1996,2,29] and [1997,2,28]
         is (1,0,0) (observe the truncation of the invalid date [1997,2,29] to
         [1997,2,28] here!), whereas the difference between [1997,2,28] and
         [1996,2,29] is (0,-11,-28) ([1997,2,28] minus 11 months is
         [1996,3,28], which minus 28 days is not [1996,3,0] but of course
         [1996,2,29]).
         "Benign" examples such as for instance the difference between
         [1964,1,3] and [2009,9,10] are completely symmetrical: The difference
         in this example is (45,8,7), whereas the difference between
         [2009,9,10] and [1964,1,3] is (-45,-8,-7), as would normally be
         expected. In this example, the result is also the same as the one
         returned by "Delta_YMD()".
         All these counter-intuitive effects are due to the fact that months
         (and due to leap years, also years) do not correspond to a fixed
         number of days, so the semantics of "plus one month" or "plus one
         year" are in fact undefined.
         The present function is an attempt to provide a definition which is
         intuitive most of the time, and at least consistent the rest of the
         time.
         Other definitions are of course possible, but most often lead to
         contradictions (e.g., the results and the given first date do not add
         up to the second given date).
         See the file "datecalc.pl" in the "examples" subdirectory of this
         distribution for a way to play around with this function, or go to
         http://www.engelschall.com/u/sb/datecalc/ for the online version.
         An error occurs if any of the two given dates is invalid, or if any
         intermediate result leads to an invalid date (this does not apply to
         truncation, however, as explained above).
       o "($D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dhh,$Dmm,$Dss) =
         N_Delta_YMDHMS($year1,$month1,$day1, $hour1,$min1,$sec1,
         $year2,$month2,$day2, $hour2,$min2,$sec2);"
         This function essentially does the same as the function
         "N_Delta_YMD()" described immediately above, except that also the
         difference in hours, minutes and seconds is taken into account.
         This function is loosely based on recipe #17 a) (see the section
         "RECIPES" below near the end of this document).
         However, the code of recipe #17 a) actually does not treat positive
         and negative values symmetrically and consistently.
         This new routine does.
         The return values of this function (including the time differences)
         are guaranteed to all have the same sign (or to be zero). This is the
         reason for the "N" that precedes the name of this function, which is
         intended to mean "normalized" (or "new").
         Moreover, the results are guaranteed to be "minimal", in the sense
         that "|$D_m| < 12", "|$D_d| < 31", "|$Dhh| < 24", "|$Dmm| < 60" and
         "|$Dss| < 60" (which is equivalent to $D_m lying in the range
         "[-11..+11]", $D_d lying in the range "[-30..+30]", $Dhh lying in the
         range "[-23..+23]", and $Dmm and $Dss both lying in the range
         "[-59..+59]").
       o "($Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds) = Normalize_DHMS($Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds);"
         This function takes four arbitrary values for days, hours, minutes
         and seconds (which may have different signs) and renormalizes them so
         that the values for hours, minutes and seconds will lie in the ranges
         "[-23..23]", "[-59..59]" and "[-59..59]", respectively, and so that
         all four values have the same sign (or are zero).
         The given values are left untouched, i.e., unchanged.
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_Days($year,$month,$day, $Dd);"
         This function has two principal uses:
         First, it can be used to calculate a new date, given an initial date
         and an offset (which may be positive or negative) in days, in order
         to answer questions like "today plus 90 days -- which date gives
         that?".
         (In order to add a weeks offset, simply multiply the weeks offset
         with "7" and use that as your days offset.)
         Second, it can be used to convert the canonical representation of a
         date, i.e., the number of that day (where counting starts at the 1st
         of January in 1 A.D.), back into a date given as year, month and day.
         Because counting starts at "1", you will actually have to subtract
         "1" from the canonical date in order to get back the original date:
           $canonical = Date_to_Days($year,$month,$day);
           ($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_Days(1,1,1, $canonical - 1);
         Moreover, this function is the inverse of the function
         ""Delta_Days()"":
           Add_Delta_Days(@date1, Delta_Days(@date1, @date2))
         yields "@date2" again, whereas
           Add_Delta_Days(@date2, -Delta_Days(@date1, @date2))
         yields "@date1", and
           Delta_Days(@date1, Add_Delta_Days(@date1, $delta))
         yields "$delta" again.
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) =
         Add_Delta_DHMS($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds);"
         This function serves to add a days, hours, minutes and seconds offset
         to a given date and time, in order to answer questions like "today
         and now plus 7 days but minus 5 hours and then plus 30 minutes, what
         date and time gives that?":
           ($y,$m,$d,$H,$M,$S) = Add_Delta_DHMS(Today_and_Now(), +7,-5,+30,0);
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_YM($year,$month,$day, $Dy,$Dm);"
         This function can be used to add a year and/or month offset to a
         given date.
         In contrast to the function described immediately below
         (""Add_Delta_YMD()""), this function does no "wrapping" into the next
         month if the day happens to lie outside the valid range for the
         resulting year and month (after adding the year and month offsets).
         Instead, it simply truncates the day to the last possible day of the
         resulting month.
         Examples:
         Adding an offset of 0 years, 1 month to the date [1999,1,31] would
         result in the (invalid) date [1999,2,31]. The function replaces this
         result by the (valid) date [1999,2,28].
         Adding an offset of 1 year, 1 month to the same date [1999,1,31] as
         above would result in the (still invalid) date [2000,2,31]. The
         function replaces this result by the valid date [2000,2,29] (because
         2000 is a leap year).
         Note that the year and month offsets can be negative, and that they
         can have different signs.
         If you want to additionally add a days offset, use the function
         ""Add_Delta_Days()"" before or after calling ""Add_Delta_YM()"":
           @date2 = Add_Delta_Days( Add_Delta_YM(@date1, $Dy,$Dm), $Dd );
           @date2 = Add_Delta_YM( Add_Delta_Days(@date1, $Dd), $Dy,$Dm );
         Note that your result may depend on the order in which you call these
         two functions!
         Consider the date [1999,2,28] and the offsets 0 years, 1 month and 1
         day:
         [1999,2,28] plus one month is [1999,3,28], plus one day is
         [1999,3,29]. [1999,2,28] plus one day is [1999,3,1], plus one month
         is [1999,4,1].
         (Which is also the reason why the ""Add_Delta_YM()"" function does
         not allow to add a days offset, because this would actually require
         TWO functions: One for adding the days offset BEFORE and one for
         adding it AFTER applying the year/month offsets.)
         An error occurs if the initial date is not valid.
         Note that ""Add_Delta_YM( Add_Delta_YM(@date, $Dy,$Dm), -$Dy,-$Dm
         );"" will not, in general, return the original date "@date" (consider
         the examples given above!).
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_YMD($year,$month,$day,
         $Dy,$Dm,$Dd);"
         This function serves to add a years, months and days offset to a
         given date.
         (In order to add a weeks offset, simply multiply the weeks offset
         with "7" and add this number to your days offset.)
         Note that the three offsets for years, months and days are applied
         independently from each other. This also allows them to have
         different signs.
         The years and months offsets are applied first, and the days offset
         is applied last.
         If the resulting date happens to fall on a day after the end of the
         resulting month, like the 32nd of April or the 30th of February, then
         the date is simply counted forward into the next month (possibly also
         into the next year) by the number of excessive days (e.g., the 32nd
         of April will become the 2nd of May).
         BEWARE that this behaviour differs from that of previous versions of
         this module! In previous versions, the day was simply truncated to
         the maximum number of days in the resulting month.
         If you want the previous behaviour, use the new function
         ""Add_Delta_YM()"" (described immediately above) plus the function
         ""Add_Delta_Days()"" instead.
         BEWARE also that because a year and a month offset is not equivalent
         to a fixed number of days, the transformation performed by this
         function is NOT ALWAYS REVERSIBLE!
         This is in contrast to the functions ""Add_Delta_Days()"" and
         ""Add_Delta_DHMS()"", which are fully and truly reversible (with the
         help of the functions ""Delta_Days()"" and ""Delta_DHMS()"", for
         instance).
         Note that for this same reason,
           @date = Add_Delta_YMD(
                   Add_Delta_YMD(@date, $Dy,$Dm,$Dd), -$Dy,-$Dm,-$Dd);
         will in general NOT return the initial date "@date", even though
           @date2 = Add_Delta_YMD( @date1, Delta_YMD(@date1, @date2) );
         will always return the second date "@date2", and
           @date1 = Add_Delta_YMD( @date2, map(-$_, Delta_YMD(@date1, @date2)) );
         which is the same as
           @date1 = Add_Delta_YMD( @date2, Delta_YMD(@date2, @date1) );
         will always return the first date "@date1".
         Examples:
           [1996,1,31] + ( 6, 1,-2) = [2002,3,1]
           [2002,3, 1] + (-6,-1, 2) = [1996,2,3] # EXPECTED: [1996,1,31]
           (6,2,-30) == Delta_YMD(1996,1,31, 2002,3,1);
           [1996,1,31] + ( 6, 2,-30) = [2002,3, 1]
           [2002,3, 1] + (-6,-2, 30) = [1996,1,31] # OK
           (6,1,-2) == Delta_YMD(1996,2,3, 2002,3,1);
           [1996,2,3] + ( 6, 1,-2) = [2002,3,1]
           [2002,3,1] + (-6,-1, 2) = [1996,2,3] # OK
         Note that this is NOT a program bug but NECESSARILY so, because of
         the variable lengths of years and months, and hence because of the
         ambiguity of the difference between two dates in terms of years,
         months and days, i.e., the fact that the difference between two dates
         can be expressed in more than one way:
           [1996,1,31] + (6,1, -2) = [2002,3,1]
           [1996,1,31] + (6,2,-30) = [2002,3,1]
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) =
         Add_Delta_YMDHMS($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $D_y,$D_m,$D_d,
         $Dh,$Dm,$Ds);"
         Same as the function above, except that a time offset may be given in
         addition to the year, month and day offset.
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Add_N_Delta_YMD($year,$month,$day,
         $Dy,$Dm,$Dd);"
         This function is actually a shortcut for applying the function
         "Add_Delta_YM()" first, followed by the function "Add_Delta_Days()",
         i.e., this function does exactly the same as
          ($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_Days( Add_Delta_YM($year,$month,$day,$Dy,$Dm), $Dd );
         Beware that, if necessary, the function "Add_Delta_YM()" truncates
         the resulting day of the month to the largest allowable value for
         that month, i.e., the (invalid) result [2009,2,31] is automatically
         transformed into [2009,2,28].
         For more details on this truncation, see the description of the
         function "Add_Delta_YM()" further above.
         This function is meant to be complementary with the function
         "N_Delta_YMD()" described further above.
         This means that it is guaranteed that the result returned by
           Add_N_Delta_YMD( @date1, N_Delta_YMD(@date1, @date2) );
         is always identical with the given date "@date2".
         Note however that unlike with function "Add_Delta_YMD()", the reverse
         is not true here, i.e.,
           ($Dy,$Dm,$Dd) = N_Delta_YMD(@date1,@date2);
           @date = Add_N_Delta_YMD(@date2, -$Dy,-$Dm,-$Dd);
         will NOT always return the initial date "@date1".
         Example:
           (0,11,3) == N_Delta_YMD(2008,2,29, 2009,2,1);
           [2008,2,29] + (0, 11, 3) = [2009,2, 1]
           [2009,2, 1] + (0,-11,-3) = [2008,2,27] # EXPECTED: [2008,2,29]
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) =
         Add_N_Delta_YMDHMS($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec,
         $D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dhh,$Dmm,$Dss);"
         This function essentially does the same as the function
         "Add_N_Delta_YMD()" described immediately above, except that also the
         difference in hours, minutes and seconds is taken into account.
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $doy,$dow,$dst) =
         System_Clock([$gmt]);"
         If your operating system supports the corresponding system calls
         (""time()"" and ""localtime()"" or ""gmtime()""), this function will
         return the information provided by your system clock, i.e., the
         current date and time, the number of the day of year, the number of
         the day of week and a flag signaling whether daylight savings time is
         currently in effect or not.
         The ranges of values returned (and their meanings) are as follows:
                 $year   :   1970..2038 (or more)  [Unix etc.]
                 $year   :   1904..2040            [MacOS Classic]
                 $month  :   1..12
                 $day    :   1..31
                 $hour   :   0..23
                 $min    :   0..59
                 $sec    :   0..59    (0..61 on some systems)
                 $doy    :   1..366
                 $dow    :   1..7
                 $dst    :  -1..1
         "$doy" is the day of year, sometimes also referred to as the "julian
         date", which starts at "1" and goes up to the number of days in that
         year.
         The day of week ("$dow") will be "1" for Monday, "2" for Tuesday and
         so on until "7" for Sunday.
         The daylight savings time flag ("$dst") will be ""-1"" if this
         information is not available on your system, "0" for no daylight
         savings time (i.e., winter time) and "1" when daylight savings time
         is in effect.
         If your operating system does not provide the necessary system calls,
         calling this function will result in a fatal "not available on this
         system" error message.
         If you want to handle this exception yourself, use ""eval"" as
         follows:
           eval { ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $doy,$dow,$dst) =
             System_Clock(); };
           if ($@)
           {
               # Handle missing system clock
               # (For instance, ask user to enter this information manually)
           }
         Note that curlies ("{" and "}") are used here to delimit the
         statement to be "eval"ed (which is the way to catch exceptions in
         Perl), and not quotes (which is a way to evaluate Perl expressions at
         runtime).
         If the optional (boolean) input parameter "$gmt" is given, a "true"
         value ("1") will cause ""gmtime()"" to be used instead of
         ""localtime()"", internally, thus returning Greenwich Mean Time (GMT,
         or UTC) instead of local time.
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Today([$gmt]);"
         This function returns a subset of the values returned by the function
         ""System_Clock()"" (see above for details), namely the current year,
         month and day.
         A fatal "not available on this system" error message will appear if
         the corresponding system calls are not supported by your current
         operating system.
         If the optional (boolean) input parameter "$gmt" is given, a "true"
         value ("1") will cause ""gmtime()"" to be used instead of
         ""localtime()"", internally, thus returning Greenwich Mean Time (GMT,
         or UTC) instead of local time.
       o "($hour,$min,$sec) = Now([$gmt]);"
         This function returns a subset of the values returned by the function
         ""System_Clock()"" (see above for details), namely the current time
         (hours, minutes and full seconds).
         A fatal "not available on this system" error message will appear if
         the corresponding system calls are not supported by your current
         operating system.
         If the optional (boolean) input parameter "$gmt" is given, a "true"
         value ("1") will cause ""gmtime()"" to be used instead of
         ""localtime()"", internally, thus returning Greenwich Mean Time (GMT,
         or UTC) instead of local time.
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) = Today_and_Now([$gmt]);"
         This function returns a subset of the values returned by the function
         ""System_Clock()"" (see above for details), namely the current date
         (year, month, day) and time (hours, minutes and full seconds).
         A fatal "not available on this system" error message will appear if
         the corresponding system calls are not supported by your current
         operating system.
         If the optional (boolean) input parameter "$gmt" is given, a "true"
         value ("1") will cause ""gmtime()"" to be used instead of
         ""localtime()"", internally, thus returning Greenwich Mean Time (GMT,
         or UTC) instead of local time.
       o "$year = This_Year([$gmt]);"
         This function returns the current year, according to local time.
         A fatal "not available on this system" error message will appear if
         the corresponding system calls are not supported by your current
         operating system.
         If the optional (boolean) input parameter "$gmt" is given, a "true"
         value ("1") will cause ""gmtime()"" to be used instead of
         ""localtime()"", internally, thus returning Greenwich Mean Time (GMT,
         or UTC) instead of local time. However, this will only make a
         difference within a few hours around New Year (unless you are on a
         Pacific island, where this can be almost 24 hours).
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $doy,$dow,$dst) =
         Gmtime([time]);"
         This is Date::Calc's equivalent of Perl's built-in "gmtime()"
         function.  See also "gmtime" in perlfunc(1).
         With the optional argument "time" (i.e., seconds since the epoch),
         this function will return the corresponding values for that
         particular time (instead of the current time when this parameter is
         omitted).
         The ranges of values returned (and their meanings) are as follows:
                 $year   :   1970..2038 (or more)  [Unix etc.]
                 $year   :   1904..2040            [MacOS Classic]
                 $month  :   1..12
                 $day    :   1..31
                 $hour   :   0..23
                 $min    :   0..59
                 $sec    :   0..59
                 $doy    :   1..366
                 $dow    :   1..7
                 $dst    :  -1..1
         "$doy" is the day of year, sometimes also referred to as the "julian
         date", which starts at "1" and goes up to the number of days in that
         year.
         The day of week ("$dow") will be "1" for Monday, "2" for Tuesday and
         so on until "7" for Sunday.
         The daylight savings time flag ("$dst") will be ""-1"" if this
         information is not available on your system, "0" for no daylight
         savings time (i.e., winter time) and "1" when daylight savings time
         is in effect.
         A fatal "time out of range" error will occur if the given time value
         is out of range "[0..(~0>>1)]".
         If the time value is omitted, the "time()" function is called
         instead, internally.
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec, $doy,$dow,$dst) =
         Localtime([time]);"
         This is Date::Calc's equivalent of Perl's built-in "localtime()"
         function.  See also "localtime" in perlfunc(1).
         The ranges of values returned (and their meanings) are as follows:
                 $year   :   1970..2038 (or more)  [Unix etc.]
                 $year   :   1904..2040            [MacOS Classic]
                 $month  :   1..12
                 $day    :   1..31
                 $hour   :   0..23
                 $min    :   0..59
                 $sec    :   0..59
                 $doy    :   1..366
                 $dow    :   1..7
                 $dst    :  -1..1
         "$doy" is the day of year, sometimes also referred to as the "julian
         date", which starts at "1" and goes up to the number of days in that
         year.
         The day of week ("$dow") will be "1" for Monday, "2" for Tuesday and
         so on until "7" for Sunday.
         The daylight savings time flag ("$dst") will be ""-1"" if this
         information is not available on your system, "0" for no daylight
         savings time (i.e., winter time) and "1" when daylight savings time
         is in effect.
         A fatal "time out of range" error will occur if the given time value
         is out of range "[0..(~0>>1)]".
         If the time value is omitted, the "time()" function is called
         instead, internally.
       o "$time = Mktime($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec);"
         This function converts a date into a time value, i.e., into the
         number of seconds since whatever moment in time your system considers
         to be the "epoch". On Unix and most other systems this is the number
         of seconds since January 1st 1970 at midnight (GMT). On MacOS Classic
         this is the number of seconds since January 1st 1904 at midnight
         (local time).
         The function is similar to the "POSIX::mktime()" function (see
         "mktime" in POSIX(1) for more details), but in contrast to the
         latter, it expects dates in the usual ranges used throughout this
         module: The year 2001 stays year 2001, and months are numbered from 1
         to 12.
         A fatal "date out of range" error will occur if the given date cannot
         be expressed in terms of seconds since the epoch (this happens for
         instance when the date lies before the epoch, or if it is later than
         19-Jan-2038 03:14:07 GMT on 32 bit Unix systems, or later than
         06-Feb-2040 06:28:15 (local time) on a Macintosh with MacOS Classic).
         Just like the "POSIX::mktime()" function, this function uses the
         "mktime()" system call, internally.
         This means that the given date and time is considered to be in local
         time, and that the value returned by this function will depend on
         your machine's local settings such as the time zone, whether daylight
         savings time is (or was, at the time) in effect, and the system clock
         itself.
         BEWARE that "mktime()" does not always return the same time value as
         fed into "localtime()", when you feed the output of "localtime()"
         back into "mktime()", on some systems!
         I.e., ""Mktime((Localtime($time))[0..5])"" will not always return the
         same value as given in "$time"!
       o "($D_y,$D_m,$D_d, $Dh,$Dm,$Ds, $dst) = Timezone([time]);"
         This function returns the difference between ""localtime(time)"" and
         ""gmtime(time)"", which is the timezone offset in effect for the
         current location and the given ""time"".
         This offset is positive if you are located to the east of Greenwich,
         and is usually negative (except during daylight savings time, in some
         locations) if you are located to the west of Greenwich.
         Note that this offset is influenced by all of the relevant system
         settings and parameters on your machine; such as locales, environment
         variables (e.g. ""TZ"") and the system clock itself. See the relevant
         documentation on your system for more details.
         If the ""time"" is omitted, the ""time()"" function will be called
         automatically, internally (similar to the built-in functions
         ""localtime()"" and ""gmtime()"" in Perl).
         A fatal "time out of range" error will occur if the given time value
         is out of range "[0..(~0>>1)]".
         The last item of the returned list is a flag which indicates whether
         daylight savings time is currently in effect. This flag is negative
         (-1) if this information is not available on your system. It is zero
         (0) when daylight savings time is off, and positive (+1) when
         daylight savings time is on.
         Thus you can check very quickly whether daylight savings time is
         currently in effect by evaluating this function in scalar context (in
         scalar context, Perl returns the last item of a list):
           if (scalar Timezone > 0) { # yes, daylight savings time
         However, a slightly more efficient way would be this:
           if (scalar System_Clock > 0) { # yes, daylight savings time
       o "$time = Date_to_Time($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec);"
         This function is a replacement for the BSD function "timegm()" (which
         is not available on all Unix systems), which converts a given date
         and time into a time value, i.e., into the number of seconds since
         whatever moment in time your system considers to be the "epoch". On
         Unix and most other systems this is the number of seconds since
         January 1st 1970 at midnight (GMT). On MacOS Classic this is the
         number of seconds since January 1st 1904 at midnight (local time).
         Under Unix, the date and time are considered to be in UTC ("Universal
         Time Coordinated", and so is the resulting time value.
         UTC is almost the same as GMT (or "Greenwich Mean Time"), except that
         UTC has leap seconds (in order to account for small variations in the
         rotation of the earth, for instance), whereas GMT does not.
         Under MacOS Classic, however, both input and output are considered to
         be in local time.
         The ranges of year and month follow the same rules as throughout the
         rest of this module (and not the contorted rules of its Unix
         equivalent), i.e., the year "2001" stays "2001" and the month ranges
         from 1 to 12.
         A fatal "date out of range" error will occur if the given date cannot
         be expressed in terms of seconds since the epoch (this happens for
         instance when the date lies before the epoch, or if it is later than
         19-Jan-2038 03:14:07 GMT on 32 bit Unix systems, or later than
         06-Feb-2040 06:28:15 (local time) on a Macintosh with MacOS Classic).
         This function should be very fast, because it is implemented in a
         very straightforward manner and doesn't use any internal system
         calls.
         Moreover, the functions "Date_to_Time()" and "Time_to_Date()" are
         guaranteed to be complementary, i.e., that
         ""Date_to_Time(Time_to_Date($time))"" and
         ""Time_to_Date(Date_to_Time($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec))""
         will always return the initial values.
       o "($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) = Time_to_Date([time]);"
         This function is an alternative to the POSIX "gmtime()" function (and
         its built-in Perl equivalent), which converts a given time value into
         the corresponding date and time. The given time value must be the
         number of seconds since whatever moment in time your system considers
         to be the "epoch". On Unix and most other systems this is the number
         of seconds since January 1st 1970 at midnight (GMT). On MacOS Classic
         this is the number of seconds since January 1st 1904 at midnight
         (local time).
         Under Unix, the given time value is considered to be in UTC
         ("Universal Time Coordinated", and so is the resulting date and time.
         UTC is almost the same as GMT (or "Greenwich Mean Time"), except that
         UTC has leap seconds (in order to account for small variations in the
         rotation of the earth, for instance), whereas GMT does not.
         Under MacOS Classic, however, both input and output are considered to
         be in local time.
         If the input value ""time"" is omitted, the ""time()"" function will
         be called automatically, internally (similar to the built-in
         functions ""localtime()"" and ""gmtime()"" in Perl).
         A fatal "time out of range" error will occur if the given time value
         is negative.
         This function should be very fast, because it is implemented in a
         very straightforward manner and doesn't use any internal system calls
         (except for "time()", if the input value is omitted).
         Moreover, the functions "Date_to_Time()" and "Time_to_Date()" are
         guaranteed to be complementary, i.e., that
         ""Date_to_Time(Time_to_Date($time))"" and
         ""Time_to_Date(Date_to_Time($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec))""
         will always return the initial values.
       o "($year,$month,$day) = Easter_Sunday($year);"
         This function calculates the date of Easter Sunday for all years in
         the range from 1583 to 2299 (all other year numbers will result in a
         fatal "year out of range" error message) using the method known as
         the "Gaussian Rule".
         Some related christian feast days which depend on the date of Easter
         Sunday:
           Carnival Monday / Rosenmontag / Veille du Mardi Gras   =  -48 days
           Mardi Gras / Karnevalsdienstag / Mardi Gras            =  -47 days
           Ash Wednesday / Aschermittwoch / Mercredi des Cendres  =  -46 days
           Palm Sunday / Palmsonntag / Dimanche des Rameaux       =   -7 days
           Easter Friday / Karfreitag / Vendredi Saint            =   -2 days
           Easter Saturday / Ostersamstag / Samedi de Paques      =   -1 day
           Easter Monday / Ostermontag / Lundi de Paques          =   +1 day
           Ascension of Christ / Christi Himmelfahrt / Ascension  =  +39 days
           Whitsunday / Pfingstsonntag / Dimanche de Pentecote    =  +49 days
           Whitmonday / Pfingstmontag / Lundi de Pentecote        =  +50 days
           Feast of Corpus Christi / Fronleichnam / Fete-Dieu     =  +60 days
         Use the offsets shown above to calculate the date of the
         corresponding feast day as follows:
           ($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_Days(Easter_Sunday($year), $offset));
       o "if ($month = Decode_Month($string[,$lang]))"
         This function takes a string as its argument, which should contain
         the name of a month in the given or currently selected language (see
         further below for details about the multi-language support of this
         package), or any uniquely identifying abbreviation of a month's name
         (i.e., the first few letters), and returns the corresponding number
         (1..12) upon a successful match, or "0" otherwise (therefore, the
         return value can also be used as the conditional expression in an
         "if" statement).
         Note that the input string may not contain any other characters which
         do not pertain to the month's name, especially no leading or trailing
         whitespace.
         Note also that matching is performed in a case-insensitive manner
         (this may depend on the "locale" setting on your current system,
         though!)
         With "1" ("English") as the given language, the following examples
         will all return the value "9":
           $month = Decode_Month("s",1);
           $month = Decode_Month("Sep",1);
           $month = Decode_Month("septemb",1);
           $month = Decode_Month("September",1);
       o "if ($dow = Decode_Day_of_Week($string[,$lang]))"
         This function takes a string as its argument, which should contain
         the name of a day of week in the given or currently selected language
         (see further below for details about the multi-language support of
         this package), or any uniquely identifying abbreviation of the name
         of a day of week (i.e., the first few letters), and returns the
         corresponding number (1..7) upon a successful match, or "0" otherwise
         (therefore, the return value can also be used as the conditional
         expression in an "if" statement).
         Note that the input string may not contain any other characters which
         do not pertain to the name of the day of week, especially no leading
         or trailing whitespace.
         Note also that matching is performed in a case-insensitive manner
         (this may depend on the "locale" setting on your current system,
         though!)
         With "1" ("English") as the given language, the following examples
         will all return the value "3":
           $dow = Decode_Day_of_Week("w",1);
           $dow = Decode_Day_of_Week("Wed",1);
           $dow = Decode_Day_of_Week("wednes",1);
           $dow = Decode_Day_of_Week("Wednesday",1);
       o "if ($lang = Decode_Language($string))"
         This function takes a string as its argument, which should contain
         the name of one of the languages supported by this package (IN THIS
         VERY LANGUAGE ITSELF), or any uniquely identifying abbreviation of
         the name of a language (i.e., the first few letters), and returns its
         corresponding internal number (1..14 in the original distribution)
         upon a successful match, or "0" otherwise (therefore, the return
         value can also be used as the conditional expression in an "if"
         statement).
         Note that the input string may not contain any other characters which
         do not pertain to the name of a language, especially no leading or
         trailing whitespace.
         Note also that matching is performed in a case-insensitive manner
         (this may depend on the "locale" setting on your current system,
         though!)
         The original distribution supports the following fourteen languages:
                     English                    ==>    1    (default)
                     Francais    (French)       ==>    2
                     Deutsch     (German)       ==>    3
                     Espan~ol     (Spanish)      ==>    4
                     Portugues   (Portuguese)   ==>    5
                     Nederlands  (Dutch)        ==>    6
                     Italiano    (Italian)      ==>    7
                     Norsk       (Norwegian)    ==>    8
                     Svenska     (Swedish)      ==>    9
                     Dansk       (Danish)       ==>   10
                     suomi       (Finnish)      ==>   11
                     Magyar      (Hungarian)    ==>   12
                     polski      (Polish)       ==>   13
                     Romaneste   (Romanian)     ==>   14
         See the section "How to install additional languages" in the file
         "INSTALL.txt" in this distribution for how to add more languages to
         this package.
         In the original distribution (no other languages installed), the
         following examples will all return the value "3":
           $lang = Decode_Language("d");
           $lang = Decode_Language("de");
           $lang = Decode_Language("Deutsch");
         Note that you may not be able to enter the special international
         characters in some of the languages' names over the keyboard directly
         on some systems.
         This should never be a problem, though; just enter an abbreviation of
         the name of the language consisting of the first few letters up to
         the character before the first special international character.
       o "if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_EU($string[,$lang]))"
         This function scans a given string and tries to parse any date which
         might be embedded in it.
         The function returns an empty list if it can't successfully extract a
         valid date from its input string, or else it returns the date found.
         The function accepts almost any format, as long as the date is given
         in the european order (hence its name) day-month-year.
         Thereby, zero or more NON-NUMERIC characters may PRECEDE the day and
         FOLLOW the year.
         Moreover, zero or more NON-ALPHANUMERIC characters are permitted
         BETWEEN these three items (i.e., between day and month and between
         month and year).
         The month may be given either numerically (i.e., a number from "1" to
         "12"), or alphanumerically, i.e., as the name of the month in the
         given or currently selected language, or any uniquely identifying
         abbreviation thereof.
         (See further below for details about the multi-language support of
         this package!)
         If the year is given as one or two digits only (i.e., if the year is
         less than 100), it is mapped to a "window" of +/- 50 years around the
         current year, as described by the "Moving_Window()" function (see
         further below).
         If the day, month and year are all given numerically but WITHOUT any
         delimiting characters between them, this string of digits will be
         mapped to the day, month and year as follows:
                         Length:        Mapping:
                           3              dmy
                           4              dmyy
                           5              dmmyy
                           6              ddmmyy
                           7              dmmyyyy
                           8              ddmmyyyy
         (Where "d" stands for "day", "m" stands for "month" and "y" stands
         for "year".)
         All other strings consisting purely of digits (without any
         intervening delimiters) are rejected, i.e., not recognized.
         Examples:
           "3.1.64"
           "3 1 64"
           "03.01.64"
           "03/01/64"
           "3. Jan 1964"
           "Birthday: 3. Jan '64 in Backnang/Germany"
           "03-Jan-64"
           "3.Jan1964"
           "3Jan64"
           "030164"
           "3ja64"
           "3164"
         Experiment! (See the corresponding example applications in the
         "examples" subdirectory of this distribution in order to do so.)
       o "if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_US($string[,$lang]))"
         This function scans a given string and tries to parse any date which
         might be embedded in it.
         The function returns an empty list if it can't successfully extract a
         valid date from its input string, or else it returns the date found.
         The function accepts almost any format, as long as the date is given
         in the U.S. american order (hence its name) month-day-year.
         Thereby, zero or more NON-ALPHANUMERIC characters may PRECEDE and
         FOLLOW the month (i.e., precede the month and separate it from the
         day which follows behind).
         Moreover, zero or more NON-NUMERIC characters are permitted BETWEEN
         the day and the year, as well as AFTER the year.
         The month may be given either numerically (i.e., a number from "1" to
         "12"), or alphanumerically, i.e., as the name of the month in the
         given or currently selected language, or any uniquely identifying
         abbreviation thereof.
         (See further below for details about the multi-language support of
         this package!)
         If the year is given as one or two digits only (i.e., if the year is
         less than 100), it is mapped to a "window" of +/- 50 years around the
         current year, as described by the "Moving_Window()" function (see
         further below).
         If the month, day and year are all given numerically but WITHOUT any
         delimiting characters between them, this string of digits will be
         mapped to the month, day and year as follows:
                         Length:        Mapping:
                           3              mdy
                           4              mdyy
                           5              mddyy
                           6              mmddyy
                           7              mddyyyy
                           8              mmddyyyy
         (Where "m" stands for "month", "d" stands for "day" and "y" stands
         for "year".)
         All other strings consisting purely of digits (without any
         intervening delimiters) are rejected, i.e., not recognized.
         If only the day and the year form a contiguous string of digits, they
         will be mapped as follows:
                         Length:        Mapping:
                           2              dy
                           3              dyy
                           4              ddyy
                           5              dyyyy
                           6              ddyyyy
         (Where "d" stands for "day" and "y" stands for "year".)
         Examples:
           "1 3 64"
           "01/03/64"
           "Jan 3 '64"
           "Jan 3 1964"
           "===> January 3rd 1964 (birthday)"
           "Jan31964"
           "Jan364"
           "ja364"
           "1364"
         Experiment! (See the corresponding example applications in the
         "examples" subdirectory of this distribution in order to do so.)
       o "$year = Fixed_Window($yy);"
         This function applies a "fixed window" strategy to two-digit year
         numbers in order to convert them into four-digit year numbers.
         All other year numbers are passed through unchanged, except for
         negative year numbers, which cause the function to return zero ("0")
         instead.
         Two-digit year numbers ""yy"" below 70 are converted to ""20yy"",
         whereas year numbers equal to or greater than 70 (but less than 100)
         are converted to ""19yy"".
         In the original distribution of this package, the base century is set
         to "1900" and the base year to "70" (which is a standard on UNIX
         systems), but these constants (also called the "epoch") can actually
         be chosen at will (in the files "DateCalc.c" and "DateCalc.h") at
         compile time of this module.
       o "$year = Moving_Window($yy);"
         This function applies a "moving window" strategy to two-digit year
         numbers in order to convert them into four-digit year numbers,
         provided the necessary system calls (system clock) are available.
         Otherwise the function falls back to the "fixed window" strategy
         described in the function above.
         All other year numbers are passed through unchanged, except for
         negative year numbers, which cause the function to return zero ("0")
         instead.
         Two-digit year numbers are mapped according to a "window" of 50 years
         in both directions (past and future) around the current year.
         That is, two-digit year numbers are first mapped to the same century
         as the current year. If the resulting year is smaller than the
         current year minus 50, then one more century is added to the result.
         If the resulting year is equal to or greater than the current year
         plus 50, then a century is subtracted from the result.
       o "$date = Compress($year,$month,$day);"
         WARNING: This function is legacy code, its use is deprecated!
         This function encodes a date in 16 bits, which is the value being
         returned.
         The encoding scheme is as follows:
                     Bit number:    FEDCBA9 8765 43210
                     Contents:      yyyyyyy mmmm ddddd
         (Where the "yyyyyyy" contain the number of the year, "mmmm" the
         number of the month and "ddddd" the number of the day.)
         The function returns "0" if the given input values do not represent a
         valid date. Therefore, the return value of this function can also be
         used as the conditional expression in an "if" statement, in order to
         check whether the given input values constitute a valid date).
         Through this special encoding scheme, it is possible to COMPARE
         compressed dates for equality and order (less than/greater than)
         WITHOUT any previous DECODING!
         Note however that contiguous dates do NOT necessarily have contiguous
         compressed representations!
         I.e., incrementing the compressed representation of a date MAY OR MAY
         NOT yield a valid new date!
         Note also that this function can only handle dates within one
         century.
         This century can be chosen at will (at compile time of this module)
         by defining a base century and year (also called the "epoch"). In the
         original distribution of this package, the base century is set to
         "1900" and the base year to "70" (which is standard on UNIX systems).
         This allows this function to handle dates from "1970" up to "2069".
         If the given year is equal to, say, "95", this package will
         automatically assume that you really meant "1995" instead. However,
         if you specify a year number which is SMALLER than 70, like "64", for
         instance, this package will assume that you really meant "2064".
         You are not confined to two-digit (abbreviated) year numbers, though.
         The function also accepts "full-length" year numbers, provided that
         they lie in the supported range (i.e., from "1970" to "2069", in the
         original configuration of this package).
         Note that this function is maintained mainly for backward
         compatibility, and that its use is not recommended.
       o "if (($century,$year,$month,$day) = Uncompress($date))"
         WARNING: This function is legacy code, its use is deprecated!
         This function decodes dates that were encoded previously using the
         function ""Compress()"".
         It returns the century, year, month and day of the date encoded in
         "$date" if "$date" represents a valid date, or an empty list
         otherwise.
         The year returned in "$year" is actually a two-digit year number
         (i.e., the year number taken modulo 100), and only the expression
         ""$century + $year"" yields the "full-length" year number (for
         example, "1900 + 95 = 1995").
         Note that this function is maintained mainly for backward
         compatibility, and that its use is not recommended.
       o "if (check_compressed($date))"
         WARNING: This function is legacy code, its use is deprecated!
         This function returns "true" ("1") if the given input value
         constitutes a valid compressed date, and "false" ("0") otherwise.
         Note that this function is maintained mainly for backward
         compatibility, and that its use is not recommended.
       o "$string = Compressed_to_Text($date[,$lang]);"
         WARNING: This function is legacy code, its use is deprecated!
         This function returns a string of fixed length (always 9 characters
         long) containing a textual representation of the compressed date
         encoded in "$date".
         This string has the form "dd-Mmm-yy", where "dd" is the two-digit
         number of the day, "Mmm" are the first three letters of the name of
         the month in the given or currently selected language (see further
         below for details about the multi-language support of this package),
         and "yy" is the two-digit year number (i.e., the year number taken
         modulo 100).
         If "$date" does not represent a valid date, the string "??-???-??" is
         returned instead.
         Note that this function is maintained mainly for backward
         compatibility, and that its use is not recommended.
       o "$string = Date_to_Text($year,$month,$day[,$lang]);"
         This function returns a string containing a textual representation of
         the given date of the form "www dd-Mmm-yyyy", where "www" are the
         first three letters of the name of the day of week in the given or
         currently selected language, or a special abbreviation, if special
         abbreviations have been defined for the given or currently selected
         language (see further below for details about the multi-language
         support of this package), "dd" is the day (one or two digits), "Mmm"
         are the first three letters of the name of the month in the given or
         currently selected language, and "yyyy" is the number of the year in
         full length.
         If the given input values do not constitute a valid date, a fatal
         "not a valid date" error occurs.
         (See the section "RECIPES" near the end of this document for a code
         snippet for how to print dates in any format you like.)
       o "$string = Date_to_Text_Long($year,$month,$day[,$lang]);"
         This function returns a string containing a textual representation of
         the given date roughly of the form "Wwwwww, dd Mmmmmm yyyy", where
         "Wwwwww" is the name of the day of week in the given or currently
         selected language (see further below for details about the multi-
         language support of this package), "dd" is the day (one or two
         digits), "Mmmmmm" is the name of the month in the given or currently
         selected language, and "yyyy" is the number of the year in full
         length.
         The exact format of the output string depends on the given or
         currently selected language. In the original distribution of this
         package, these formats are defined as follows:
           1  English    :  "Wwwwww, Mmmmmm ddth yyyy"
           2  French     :  "Wwwwww dd mmmmmm yyyy"
           3  German     :  "Wwwwww, den dd. Mmmmmm yyyy"
           4  Spanish    :  "Wwwwww, dd de mmmmmm de yyyy"
           5  Portuguese :  "Wwwwww, dia dd de mmmmmm de yyyy"
           6  Dutch      :  "Wwwwww, dd mmmmmm yyyy"
           7  Italian    :  "Wwwwww, dd Mmmmmm yyyy"
           8  Norwegian  :  "wwwwww, dd. mmmmmm yyyy"
           9  Swedish    :  "wwwwww, dd mmmmmm yyyy"
          10  Danish     :  "wwwwww, dd. mmmmmm yyyy"
          11  Finnish    :  "wwwwww, dd. mmmmmmta yyyy"
          12  Hungarian  :  "dd. Mmmmmm yyyy., wwwwww"
          13  Polish     :  "Wwwwww, dd Mmmmmm yyyy"
          14  Romanian   :  "Wwwwww dd Mmmmmm yyyy"
         (You can change these formats in the file "DateCalc.c" before
         building this module in order to suit your personal preferences.)
         If the given input values do not constitute a valid date, a fatal
         "not a valid date" error occurs.
         In order to capitalize the day of week at the beginning of the string
         in Norwegian, use
         ""ucfirst(Date_to_Text_Long($year,$month,$day,8));"".
         (See the section "RECIPES" near the end of this document for an
         example on how to print dates in any format you like.)
       o "$string = English_Ordinal($number);"
         This function returns a string containing the (english) abbreviation
         of the ordinal number for the given (cardinal) number "$number".
         I.e.,
             0  =>  '0th'    10  =>  '10th'    20  =>  '20th'
             1  =>  '1st'    11  =>  '11th'    21  =>  '21st'
             2  =>  '2nd'    12  =>  '12th'    22  =>  '22nd'
             3  =>  '3rd'    13  =>  '13th'    23  =>  '23rd'
             4  =>  '4th'    14  =>  '14th'    24  =>  '24th'
             5  =>  '5th'    15  =>  '15th'    25  =>  '25th'
             6  =>  '6th'    16  =>  '16th'    26  =>  '26th'
             7  =>  '7th'    17  =>  '17th'    27  =>  '27th'
             8  =>  '8th'    18  =>  '18th'    28  =>  '28th'
             9  =>  '9th'    19  =>  '19th'    29  =>  '29th'
         etc.
       o "$string = Calendar($year,$month[,$orthodox[,$lang]]);"
         This function returns a calendar of the given month in the given year
         (somewhat similar to the UNIX ""cal"" command), in the given or
         currently selected language (see further below for details about the
         multi-language support of this package).
         Example:
           print Calendar(1998,5);
         This will print:
                    May 1998
           Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
                             1   2   3
             4   5   6   7   8   9  10
            11  12  13  14  15  16  17
            18  19  20  21  22  23  24
            25  26  27  28  29  30  31
         If the optional boolean parameter "$orthodox" is given and true, the
         calendar starts on Sunday instead of Monday.
       o "$string = Month_to_Text($month[,$lang]);"
         This function returns the name of the given month in the given or
         currently selected language (see further below for details about the
         multi-language support of this package).
         If the given month lies outside of the valid range from "1" to "12",
         a fatal "month out of range" error will occur.
       o "$string = Day_of_Week_to_Text($dow[,$lang]);"
         This function returns the name of the given day of week in the given
         or currently selected language (see further below for details about
         the multi-language support of this package).
         If the given day of week lies outside of the valid range from "1" to
         "7", a fatal "day of week out of range" error will occur.
       o "$string = Day_of_Week_Abbreviation($dow[,$lang]);"
         This function returns the special abbreviation of the name of the
         given day of week, IF such special abbreviations have been defined
         for the given or currently selected language (see further below for
         details about the multi-language support of this package).
         (In the original distribution of this package, this was only true for
         Portuguese. Starting with version 5.1, abbreviations for Polish have
         also been introduced. Starting with version 5.7, the abbreviations
         for Portuguese have been disabled. So Polish is currently the only
         language to define such special abbreviations.)
         If not, the first three letters of the name of the day of week in the
         given or currently selected language are returned instead.
         If the given day of week lies outside of the valid range from "1" to
         "7", a fatal "day of week out of range" error will occur.
         Currently, this table of special abbreviations is only used by the
         functions ""Date_to_Text()"" and ""Calendar()"", internally.
       o "$string = Language_to_Text($lang);"
         This function returns the name of any language supported by this
         package when the internal number representing that language is given
         as input.
         The original distribution supports the following fourteen languages:
                     1   ==>   English                     (default)
                     2   ==>   Francais    (French)
                     3   ==>   Deutsch     (German)
                     4   ==>   Espan~ol     (Spanish)
                     5   ==>   Portugues   (Portuguese)
                     6   ==>   Nederlands  (Dutch)
                     7   ==>   Italiano    (Italian)
                     8   ==>   Norsk       (Norwegian)
                     9   ==>   Svenska     (Swedish)
                    10   ==>   Dansk       (Danish)
                    11   ==>   suomi       (Finnish)
                    12   ==>   Magyar      (Hungarian)
                    13   ==>   polski      (Polish)
                    14   ==>   Romaneste   (Romanian)
         See the section "How to install additional languages" in the file
         "INSTALL.txt" in this distribution for how to add more languages to
         this package.
         See the description of the function ""Languages()"" further below to
         determine how many languages are actually available in a given
         installation of this package.
       o "$lang = Language();"
       o "Language($lang); # DEPRECATED"
       o "$oldlang = Language($newlang); # DEPRECATED"
         This function can be used to determine which language is currently
         selected, and to change the selected language (this latter use is
         deprecated, because this global setting may cause conflicts between
         threads or modules running concurrently).
         Thereby, each language has a unique internal number.
         The original distribution contains the following fourteen languages:
                     1   ==>   English                     (default)
                     2   ==>   Francais    (French)
                     3   ==>   Deutsch     (German)
                     4   ==>   Espan~ol     (Spanish)
                     5   ==>   Portugues   (Portuguese)
                     6   ==>   Nederlands  (Dutch)
                     7   ==>   Italiano    (Italian)
                     8   ==>   Norsk       (Norwegian)
                     9   ==>   Svenska     (Swedish)
                    10   ==>   Dansk       (Danish)
                    11   ==>   suomi       (Finnish)
                    12   ==>   Magyar      (Hungarian)
                    13   ==>   polski      (Polish)
                    14   ==>   Romaneste   (Romanian)
         See the section "How to install additional languages" in the file
         "INSTALL.txt" in this distribution for how to add more languages to
         this package.
         See the description of the function ""Languages()"" further below to
         determine how many languages are actually available in a given
         installation of this package.
         BEWARE that in order for your programs to be portable, you should
         NEVER actually use the internal number of a language in this package
         EXPLICITLY, because the same number could mean different languages on
         different systems, depending on what languages have been added to any
         given installation of this package.
         Therefore, you should always use a statement such as
           Language(Decode_Language("Name_of_Language")); # DEPRECATED
         or
           DateCalc_Function(@parameters,Decode_Language("Name_of_Language")); # RECOMMENDED
         to select the desired language, and
           $language = Language_to_Text(Language());
         or
           $old_language = Language_to_Text(Language("Name_of_new_Language")); # DEPRECATED
         to determine the (previously) selected language.
         If the so chosen language is not available in the current
         installation, this will result in an appropriate error message,
         instead of silently using the wrong (a random) language (which just
         happens to have the same internal number in the other installation).
         BEWARE that when using the function ""Language()"", the selected
         language is a global setting, shared by all threads or modules you
         might be running concurrently, thus possibly causing conflicts
         between them.
         In order to avoid these conflicts, you should NEVER use the function
         ""Language()"", but should ALWAYS pass a language number (as returned
         by the function ""Decode_Language()"") to the functions which are
         language-dependent, which are:
         "Decode_Month()", "Decode_Day_of_Week()", "Compressed_to_Text()",
         "Date_to_Text()", "Date_to_Text_Long()", "Calendar()",
         "Month_to_Text()", "Day_of_Week_to_Text()",
         "Day_of_Week_Abbreviation()", "Decode_Date_EU()", "Decode_Date_US()",
         "Decode_Date_EU2()", "Decode_Date_US2()", "Parse_Date()".
         Note that when you pass an invalid number, such as e.g. zero, or no
         language parameter at all, these functions will revert to their
         behaviour in the versions of this module prior to 6.0, which means
         that the global setting (as set by ""Language()"") becomes active
         again (only in case of an invalid or missing language parameter!).
         In the C library "DateCalc.c", where omitting a parameter is not an
         option, passing a zero for the language is therefore the recommended
         way to guarantee backward compatibility.
       o "$max_lang = Languages();"
         This function returns the (maximum) number of languages which are
         currently available in your installation of this package.
         (This may vary from installation to installation.)
         See the section "How to install additional languages" in the file
         "INSTALL.txt" in this distribution for how to add more languages to
         this package.
         In the original distribution of this package there are fourteen
         built-in languages, therefore the value returned by this function
         will be "14" if no other languages have been added to your particular
         installation.
       o "if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_EU2($string[,$lang))"
         This function is the Perl equivalent of the function
         ""Decode_Date_EU()"" (implemented in C), included here merely as an
         example to demonstrate how easy it is to write your own routine in
         Perl (using regular expressions) adapted to your own special needs,
         should the necessity arise, and intended primarily as a basis for
         your own development.
         In one particular case this Perl version is actually slightly more
         permissive than its C equivalent, as far as the class of permitted
         intervening (i.e., delimiting) characters is concerned.
         (Can you tell the subtle, almost insignificant difference by looking
         at the code? Or by experimenting? Hint: Try the string "a3b1c64d"
         with both functions.)
       o "if (($year,$month,$day) = Decode_Date_US2($string[,$lang))"
         This function is the Perl equivalent of the function
         ""Decode_Date_US()"" (implemented in C), included here merely as an
         example to demonstrate how easy it is to write your own routine in
         Perl (using regular expressions) adapted to your own special needs,
         should the necessity arise, and intended primarily as a basis for
         your own development.
         In one particular case this Perl version is actually slightly more
         permissive than its C equivalent.
         (Hint: This is the same difference as with the ""Decode_Date_EU()""
         and ""Decode_Date_EU2()"" pair of functions.)
         In a different case, the C version is a little bit more permissive
         than its Perl equivalent.
         (Can you tell the difference by looking at the code? Or by
         experimenting?  Hint: Try the string "(1/364)" with both functions.)
       o "if (($year,$month,$day) = Parse_Date($string[,$lang))"
         This function is useful for parsing dates as returned by the UNIX
         ""date"" command or as found in the headers of e-mail (in order to
         determine the date at which some e-mail has been sent or received,
         for instance).
         Example #1:
           ($year,$month,$day) = Parse_Date(`/bin/date`);
         Example #2:
           while (<MAIL>)
           {
               if (/^From \S/)
               {
                   ($year,$month,$day) = Parse_Date($_);
                   ...
               }
               ...
           }
         The function returns an empty list if it can't extract a valid date
         from the input string.
       o "$lower = ISO_LC($string);"
         Returns a copy of the given string where all letters of the
         ISO-Latin-1 character set have been replaced by their lower case
         equivalents.
         Similar to Perl's built-in function ""lc()"" (see "lc" in
         perlfunc(1)) but for the whole ISO-Latin-1 character set, not just
         plain ASCII.
       o "$upper = ISO_UC($string);"
         Returns a copy of the given string where all letters of the
         ISO-Latin-1 character set have been replaced by their upper case
         equivalents.
         Similar to Perl's built-in function ""uc()"" (see "uc" in
         perlfunc(1)) but for the whole ISO-Latin-1 character set, not just
         plain ASCII.
       o "$string = Date::Calc::Version();"
         This function returns a string with the (numeric) version number of
         the C library ("DateCalc.c") at the core of this package (which is
         also (automatically) the version number of the "Calc.xs" file).
         Note that under all normal circumstances, this version number should
         be identical with the one found in the Perl variable
         "$Date::Calc::VERSION" (the version number of the "Calc.pm" file).
         Since this function is not exported, you always have to qualify it
         explicitly, i.e., ""Date::Calc::Version()"".
         This is to avoid possible name space conflicts with version functions
         from other modules.
RECIPES
       1)  How do I compare two dates?
           Solution #1:
             use Date::Calc qw( Date_to_Days );
             if (Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1)  <
                 Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2))
             if (Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1)  <=
                 Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2))
             if (Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1)  >
                 Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2))
             if (Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1)  >=
                 Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2))
             if (Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1)  ==
                 Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2))
             if (Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1)  !=
                 Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2))
             $cmp = (Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1)  <=>
                     Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2));
           Solution #2:
             use Date::Calc qw( Delta_Days );
             if (Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1,
                            $year2,$month2,$day2) > 0)
             if (Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1,
                            $year2,$month2,$day2) >= 0)
             if (Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1,
                            $year2,$month2,$day2) < 0)
             if (Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1,
                            $year2,$month2,$day2) <= 0)
             if (Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1,
                            $year2,$month2,$day2) == 0)
             if (Delta_Days($year1,$month1,$day1,
                            $year2,$month2,$day2) != 0)
       2)  How do I check whether a given date lies within a certain range of
           dates?
             use Date::Calc qw( Date_to_Days );
             $lower = Date_to_Days($year1,$month1,$day1);
             $upper = Date_to_Days($year2,$month2,$day2);
             $date = Date_to_Days($year,$month,$day);
             if (($date >= $lower) && ($date <= $upper))
             {
                 # ok
             }
             else
             {
                 # not ok
             }
       3)  How do I compare two dates with times? How do I check whether two
           dates and times lie more or less than a given time interval apart?
           Solution #1:
             use Date::Calc qw( Add_Delta_DHMS Date_to_Days );
             @date1 = (2002,8,31,23,59,1);
             @date2 = (2002,9,1,11,30,59); # ==> less than 12 hours
             #@date1 = (2002,8,31,22,59,1);
             #@date2 = (2002,9,1,11,30,59); # ==> more than 12 hours
             # Omit the next line if you just want to compare the two dates
             # (and change @date3 and @d3 to @date1 and @d1, respectively):
             @date3 = Add_Delta_DHMS(@date1, 0,12,0,0); # ==> is the difference within 12 hours?
             @d2 = ( Date_to_Days(@date2[0..2]), ($date2[3]*60+$date2[4])*60+$date2[5] );
             @d3 = ( Date_to_Days(@date3[0..2]), ($date3[3]*60+$date3[4])*60+$date3[5] );
             @diff = ( $d2[0]-$d3[0], $d2[1]-$d3[1] );
             if ($diff[0] > 0 and $diff[1] < 0) { $diff[0]--; $diff[1] += 86400; }
             if ($diff[0] < 0 and $diff[1] > 0) { $diff[0]++; $diff[1] -= 86400; }
             if (($diff[0] || $diff[1]) >= 0) { print "More than 12 hours.\n"; }
             else                             { print "Less than 12 hours.\n"; }
           Solution #2:
           This solution is only feasible if your dates are guaranteed to lie
           within the range given by your system's epoch and overflow date and
           time!
                Unix:    1-Jan-1970 00:00:00  to  19-Jan-2038 03:14:07
                MacOS:   1-Jan-1904 00:00:00  to   6-Feb-2040 06:28:15
             use Date::Calc qw( Date_to_Time );
             @date1 = (2002,8,31,23,59,1);
             @date2 = (2002,9,1,11,30,59); # ==> less than 12 hours
             #@date1 = (2002,8,31,22,59,1);
             #@date2 = (2002,9,1,11,30,59); # ==> more than 12 hours
             $d1 = Date_to_Time(@date1);
             $d2 = Date_to_Time(@date2);
             if ($d1 <= $d2) { print "The two dates are in chronological order.\n"; }
             else            { print "The two dates are in reversed order.\n"; }
             if ($d1 + 12*60*60 <= $d2) { print "More than 12 hours.\n"; }
             else                       { print "Less than 12 hours.\n"; }
       4)  How do I verify whether someone has a certain age?
             use Date::Calc qw( Decode_Date_EU Today leap_year Delta_Days );
             $date = <STDIN>; # get birthday
             ($year1,$month1,$day1) = Decode_Date_EU($date);
             ($year2,$month2,$day2) = Today();
             if (($day1 == 29) && ($month1 == 2) && !leap_year($year2))
                 { $day1--; }
             if ( (($year2 - $year1) >  18) ||
                ( (($year2 - $year1) == 18) &&
                (Delta_Days($year2,$month1,$day1, $year2,$month2,$day2) >= 0) ) )
             {
                 print "Ok - you are over 18.\n";
             }
             else
             {
                 print "Sorry - you aren't 18 yet!\n";
             }
             Or, alternatively (substituting the last "if" statement above):
             if (($year1+18 <=> $year2 || $month1 <=> $month2 || $day1 <=> $day2) <= 0)
                 { print "Ok - you are over 18.\n"; }
             else
                 { print "Sorry - you aren't 18 yet!\n"; }
       5)  How do I calculate the number of the week of month the current date
           lies in?
           For example:
                       April 1998
               Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
                         1   2   3   4   5  =  week #1
                 6   7   8   9  10  11  12  =  week #2
                13  14  15  16  17  18  19  =  week #3
                20  21  22  23  24  25  26  =  week #4
                27  28  29  30              =  week #5
           Solution:
             use Date::Calc qw( Today Day_of_Week );
             ($year,$month,$day) = Today();
             $week = int(($day + Day_of_Week($year,$month,1) - 2) / 7) + 1;
       6)  How do I calculate whether a given date is the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th
           or 5th of that day of week in the given month?
           For example:
                      October 2000
               Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
                                         1
                 2   3   4   5   6   7   8
                 9  10  11  12  13  14  15
                16  17  18  19  20  21  22
                23  24  25  26  27  28  29
                30  31
           Is Sunday, the 15th of October 2000, the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th or 5th
           Sunday of that month?
           Solution:
             use Date::Calc qw( Day_of_Week Delta_Days
                                Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year
                                Date_to_Text_Long English_Ordinal
                                Day_of_Week_to_Text Month_to_Text );
             ($year,$month,$day) = (2000,10,15);
             $dow = Day_of_Week($year,$month,$day);
             $n = int( Delta_Days(
                       Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year($year,$month,$dow,1),
                       $year,$month,$day)
                       / 7) + 1;
             printf("%s is the %s %s in %s %d.\n",
                 Date_to_Text_Long($year,$month,$day),
                 English_Ordinal($n),
                 Day_of_Week_to_Text($dow),
                 Month_to_Text($month),
                 $year);
           This prints:
             Sunday, October 15th 2000 is the 3rd Sunday in October 2000.
       7)  How do I calculate the date of the Wednesday of the same week as
           the current date?
           Solution #1:
             use Date::Calc qw( Today Day_of_Week Add_Delta_Days );
             $searching_dow = 3; # 3 = Wednesday
             @today = Today();
             $current_dow = Day_of_Week(@today);
             @date = Add_Delta_Days(@today, $searching_dow - $current_dow);
           Solution #2:
             use Date::Calc qw( Today Add_Delta_Days
                                Monday_of_Week Week_of_Year );
             $searching_dow = 3; # 3 = Wednesday
             @today = Today();
             @date = Add_Delta_Days( Monday_of_Week( Week_of_Year(@today) ),
                                     $searching_dow - 1 );
           Solution #3:
             use Date::Calc qw( Standard_to_Business Today
                                Business_to_Standard );
             @business = Standard_to_Business(Today());
             $business[2] = 3; # 3 = Wednesday
             @date = Business_to_Standard(@business);
       8)  How can I add a week offset to a business date (including across
           year boundaries)?
             use Date::Calc qw( Business_to_Standard Add_Delta_Days
                                Standard_to_Business );
             @temp = Business_to_Standard($year,$week,$dow);
             @temp = Add_Delta_Days(@temp, $week_offset * 7);
             ($year,$week,$dow) = Standard_to_Business(@temp);
       9)  How do I calculate the last and the next Saturday for any given
           date?
             use Date::Calc qw( Today Day_of_Week Add_Delta_Days
                                Day_of_Week_to_Text Date_to_Text );
             $searching_dow = 6; # 6 = Saturday
             @today = Today();
             $current_dow = Day_of_Week(@today);
             if ($searching_dow == $current_dow)
             {
                 @prev = Add_Delta_Days(@today,-7);
                 @next = Add_Delta_Days(@today,+7);
             }
             else
             {
                 if ($searching_dow > $current_dow)
                 {
                     @next = Add_Delta_Days(@today,
                               $searching_dow - $current_dow);
                     @prev = Add_Delta_Days(@next,-7);
                 }
                 else
                 {
                     @prev = Add_Delta_Days(@today,
                               $searching_dow - $current_dow);
                     @next = Add_Delta_Days(@prev,+7);
                 }
             }
             $dow = Day_of_Week_to_Text($searching_dow);
             print "Today is:      ", ' ' x length($dow),
                                          Date_to_Text(@today), "\n";
             print "Last $dow was:     ", Date_to_Text(@prev),  "\n";
             print "Next $dow will be: ", Date_to_Text(@next),  "\n";
           This will print something like:
             Today is:              Sun 12-Apr-1998
             Last Saturday was:     Sat 11-Apr-1998
             Next Saturday will be: Sat 18-Apr-1998
       10) How can I calculate the last business day (payday!) of a month?
           Solution #1 (holidays NOT taken into account):
             use Date::Calc qw( Days_in_Month Day_of_Week Add_Delta_Days );
             $day = Days_in_Month($year,$month);
             $dow = Day_of_Week($year,$month,$day);
             if ($dow > 5)
             {
                 ($year,$month,$day) =
                     Add_Delta_Days($year,$month,$day, 5-$dow);
             }
           Solution #2 (holidays taken into account):
           This solution expects a multi-dimensional array "@holiday", which
           contains all holidays, as follows: ""$holiday[$year][$month][$day]
           = 1;"".
           (See the description of the function ""Easter_Sunday()"" further
           above for how to calculate the moving (variable) christian feast
           days!)
           Days which are not holidays remain undefined or should have a value
           of zero in this array.
             use Date::Calc qw( Days_in_Month Add_Delta_Days Day_of_Week );
             $day = Days_in_Month($year,$month);
             while (1)
             {
                 while ($holiday[$year][$month][$day])
                 {
                     ($year,$month,$day) =
                         Add_Delta_Days($year,$month,$day, -1);
                 }
                 $dow = Day_of_Week($year,$month,$day);
                 if ($dow > 5)
                 {
                     ($year,$month,$day) =
                         Add_Delta_Days($year,$month,$day, 5-$dow);
                 }
                 else { last; }
             }
           Solution #3 (holidays taken into account, more comfortable, but
           requires Date::Calendar(3) and Date::Calc::Object(3)):
             use Date::Calc::Object qw( Today Add_Delta_YM Date_to_Text_Long );
             use Date::Calendar::Profiles qw($Profiles);
             use Date::Calendar;
             $calendar = Date::Calendar->new( $Profiles->{'DE-BW'} );
             @today = Today();
             @nextmonth = Add_Delta_YM(@today[0,1],1, 0,1);
             $workaround = $calendar->add_delta_workdays(@nextmonth,+1);
             $payday     = $calendar->add_delta_workdays($workaround,-2);
             print "Pay day = ", Date_to_Text_Long($payday->date()), "\n";
           The "workaround" is necessary due to a bug in the method
           "add_delta_workdays()" when adding a negative number of workdays.
       11) How do I convert a MS Visual Basic "DATETIME" value into its date
           and time constituents?
             use Date::Calc qw( Add_Delta_DHMS Date_to_Text );
             $datetime = "35883.121653";
             ($Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds) = ($datetime =~ /^(\d+)\.(\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)$/);
             ($year,$month,$day, $hour,$min,$sec) =
                 Add_Delta_DHMS(1900,1,1, 0,0,0, $Dd,$Dh,$Dm,$Ds);
             printf("The given date is %s %02d:%02d:%02d\n",
                 Date_to_Text($year,$month,$day), $hour, $min, $sec);
           This prints:
             The given date is Tue 31-Mar-1998 12:16:53
           Since I do not have or use Visual Basic, I can't guarantee that the
           number format assumed here is really the one used by Visual Basic -
           but you get the general idea. ":-)"
           Moreover, consider the following:
           Morten Sickel <Morten.Sickel AT nrpa.no> wrote:
           I discovered a bug in Excel (2000): Excel thinks that 1900 was a
           leap year. Users should use 31-Dec-1899 as the date to add an Excel
           date value to in order to get the correct date.
           I found out on the web that this bug originated in Lotus 123, which
           made 29-Feb-1900 an "industrial standard". MS chose to keep the bug
           in order to be compatible with Lotus 123. But they have not
           mentioned anything about it in the help files.
       12) How can I send a reminder to members of a group on the day before a
           meeting which occurs every first Friday of a month?
             use Date::Calc qw( Today Date_to_Days Add_Delta_YMD
                                Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year );
             ($year,$month,$day) = Today();
             $tomorrow = Date_to_Days($year,$month,$day) + 1;
             $dow = 5; # 5 = Friday
             $n   = 1; # 1 = First of that day of week
             $meeting_this_month = Date_to_Days(
                 Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year($year,$month,$dow,$n) );
             ($year,$month,$day) = Add_Delta_YMD($year,$month,$day, 0,1,0);
             $meeting_next_month = Date_to_Days(
                 Nth_Weekday_of_Month_Year($year,$month,$dow,$n) );
             if (($tomorrow == $meeting_this_month) ||
                 ($tomorrow == $meeting_next_month))
             {
                 # Send reminder e-mail!
             }
       13) How can I print a date in a different format than provided by the
           functions ""Date_to_Text()"", ""Date_to_Text_Long()"" or
           ""Compressed_to_Text()""?
             use Date::Calc qw( Today Day_of_Week_to_Text
                                Day_of_Week Month_to_Text
                                English_Ordinal );
             ($year,$month,$day) = Today();
           For example with leading zeros for the day: "Fri 03-Jan-1964"
             printf("%.3s %02d-%.3s-%d\n",
                 Day_of_Week_to_Text(Day_of_Week($year,$month,$day)),
                 $day,
                 Month_to_Text($month),
                 $year);
           For example in U.S. american format: "April 12th, 1998"
             $string = sprintf("%s %s, %d",
                           Month_to_Text($month),
                           English_Ordinal($day),
                           $year);
           For example in one of the possible formats as specified by
           ISO 8601:
             @date = ($year,$month,$day,$hour,$min,$sec);
             $date = sprintf("%d-%02d-%02d %02d:%02d:%02d", @date);
           (See also "printf" in perlfunc(1) and/or "sprintf" in perlfunc(1)!)
       14) How can I iterate through a range of dates?
             use Date::Calc qw( Delta_Days Add_Delta_Days );
             @start = (1999,5,27);
             @stop  = (1999,6,1);
             $j = Delta_Days(@start,@stop);
             for ( $i = 0; $i <= $j; $i++ )
             {
                 @date = Add_Delta_Days(@start,$i);
                 printf("%4d/%02d/%02d\n", @date);
             }
           Note that the loop can be improved; see also the recipe below.
       15) How can I create a (Perl) list of dates in a certain range?
             use Date::Calc qw( Delta_Days Add_Delta_Days Date_to_Text );
             sub date_range
             {
                 my(@date) = (@_)[0,1,2];
                 my(@list);
                 my($i);
                 $i = Delta_Days(@_);
                 while ($i-- >= 0)
                 {
                     push( @list, [ @date ] );
                     @date = Add_Delta_Days(@date, 1) if ($i >= 0);
                 }
                 return(@list);
             }
             @range = &date_range(1999,11,3, 1999,12,24); # in chronological order
             foreach $date (@range)
             {
                 print Date_to_Text(@{$date}), "\n";
             }
           Note that you probably shouldn't use this one, because it is much
           more efficient to iterate through all the dates (as shown in the
           recipe immediately above) than to construct such an array and then
           to loop through it. Also, it is much more space-efficient not to
           create this array.
       16) How can I calculate the difference in days between dates, but
           without counting Saturdays and Sundays?
             sub Delta_Business_Days
             {
                 my(@date1) = (@_)[0,1,2];
                 my(@date2) = (@_)[3,4,5];
                 my($minus,$result,$dow1,$dow2,$diff,$temp);
                 $minus  = 0;
                 $result = Delta_Days(@date1,@date2);
                 if ($result != 0)
                 {
                     if ($result < 0)
                     {
                         $minus = 1;
                         $result = -$result;
                         $dow1 = Day_of_Week(@date2);
                         $dow2 = Day_of_Week(@date1);
                     }
                     else
                     {
                         $dow1 = Day_of_Week(@date1);
                         $dow2 = Day_of_Week(@date2);
                     }
                     $diff = $dow2 - $dow1;
                     $temp = $result;
                     if ($diff != 0)
                     {
                         if ($diff < 0)
                         {
                             $diff += 7;
                         }
                         $temp -= $diff;
                         $dow1 += $diff;
                         if ($dow1 > 6)
                         {
                             $result--;
                             if ($dow1 > 7)
                             {
                                 $result--;
                             }
                         }
                     }
                     if ($temp != 0)
                     {
                         $temp /= 7;
                         $result -= ($temp << 1);
                     }
                 }
                 if ($minus) { return -$result; }
                 else        { return  $result; }
             }
           This solution is probably of little practical value, however,
           because it doesn't take legal holidays into account.
           See Date::Calendar(3) for how to do that.
       17) How can I "normalize" the output of the "Delta_YMDHMS()" (or
           "Delta_YMD()") function so that it contains only positive values?
           I.e., how can I show a difference in date (and time) in a more
           human-readable form, for example in order to show how much time
           until (or since) the expiration of something (e.g. an account, a
           domain, a credit card, etc.) is left (has passed)?
           Correct solution: Use the functions "N_Delta_YMDHMS()" and
           "N_Delta_YMD()" instead!
           The following gives a rudimentary sketch of a (much inferior)
           solution, which is maintained here only for historical reasons of
           this module:
           a) Delta_YMDHMS():
             #!perl
             use strict;
             use Date::Calc qw(Today_and_Now Delta_YMDHMS Add_Delta_YMDHMS Delta_DHMS Date_to_Text);
             my $today = [Today_and_Now()];
             my $target = [2005,1,1,0,0,0];
             my $sign = "until";
             my $delta = Normalize_Delta_YMDHMS($today,$target);
             if ($delta->[0] < 0)
             {
                 $sign = "since";
                 $delta = Normalize_Delta_YMDHMS($target,$today);
             }
             printf("Today is %s %02d:%02d:%02d\n", Date_to_Text(@{$today}[0..2]), @{$today}[3..5]);
             printf
             (
                 "%d year%s, %d month%s, %d day%s, %d hour%s, %d minute%s, %d second%s %s %s %02d:%02d:%02d\n",
                 $delta->[0], (($delta->[0]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $delta->[1], (($delta->[1]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $delta->[2], (($delta->[2]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $delta->[3], (($delta->[3]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $delta->[4], (($delta->[4]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $delta->[5], (($delta->[5]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $sign,
                 Date_to_Text(@{$target}[0..2]),
                 @{$target}[3..5]
             );
             sub Normalize_Delta_YMDHMS
             {
                 my($date1,$date2) = @_;
                 my(@delta);
                 @delta = Delta_YMDHMS(@$date1,@$date2);
                 while ($delta[1] < 0 or
                        $delta[2] < 0 or
                        $delta[3] < 0 or
                        $delta[4] < 0 or
                        $delta[5] < 0)
                 {
                     if ($delta[1] < 0) { $delta[0]--; $delta[1] += 12; }
                     if ($delta[2] < 0)
                     {
                         $delta[1]--;
                         @delta[2..5] = (0,0,0,0);
                         @delta[2..5] = Delta_DHMS(Add_Delta_YMDHMS(@$date1,@delta),@$date2);
                     }
                     if ($delta[3] < 0) { $delta[2]--; $delta[3] += 24; }
                     if ($delta[4] < 0) { $delta[3]--; $delta[4] += 60; }
                     if ($delta[5] < 0) { $delta[4]--; $delta[5] += 60; }
                 }
                 return \@delta;
             }
           b) Delta_YMD():
             #!perl
             use strict;
             use Date::Calc qw(Today Delta_YMD Add_Delta_YM Delta_Days Date_to_Text);
             my($sign,$delta);
             my $today = [Today()];
             my $target = [2005,1,1];
             if (Delta_Days(@$today,@$target) < 0)
             {
                 $sign = "since";
                 $delta = Normalize_Delta_YMD($target,$today);
             }
             else
             {
                 $sign = "until";
                 $delta = Normalize_Delta_YMD($today,$target);
             }
             print "Today is ", Date_to_Text(@$today), "\n";
             printf
             (
                 "%d year%s, %d month%s, %d day%s %s %s\n",
                 $delta->[0], (($delta->[0]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $delta->[1], (($delta->[1]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $delta->[2], (($delta->[2]==1)?'':'s'),
                 $sign,
                 Date_to_Text(@$target)
             );
             sub Normalize_Delta_YMD
             {
                 my($date1,$date2) = @_;
                 my(@delta);
                 @delta = Delta_YMD(@$date1,@$date2);
                 while ($delta[1] < 0 or $delta[2] < 0)
                 {
                     if ($delta[1] < 0) { $delta[0]--; $delta[1] += 12; }
                     if ($delta[2] < 0)
                     {
                         $delta[1]--;
                         $delta[2] = Delta_Days(Add_Delta_YM(@$date1,@delta[0,1]),@$date2);
                     }
                 }
                 return \@delta;
             }
           Note that for normalizing just a time vector, you can use the
           built-in function "Normalize_DHMS()". However, this will yield
           either all positive OR all negative values, NOT all positive values
           as above.
SEE ALSO
       Date::Calc::Util(3), Date::Calc::Object(3), Date::Calendar(3),
       Date::Calendar::Year(3), Date::Calendar::Profiles(3).
         "The Calendar FAQ":
         http://www.tondering.dk/claus/calendar.html
         by Claus Tondering <claus AT tondering.dk>
BEWARE
       When you are using the (deprecated) function "Language()", the language
       setting is stored in a global variable.
       This may cause conflicts between threads or modules running
       concurrently.
       Therefore, in order to avoid such conflicts, NEVER use the function
       "Language()", but ALWAYS pass a language parameter to the functions
       which are language-dependent.
VERSION
       This man page documents "Date::Calc" version 6.3.
AUTHOR
         Steffen Beyer
         mailto:STBEY AT cpan.org
         http://www.engelschall.com/u/sb/download/
COPYRIGHT
       Copyright (c) 1995 - 2009 by Steffen Beyer. All rights reserved.
LICENSE
       This package is free software; you can use, modify and redistribute it
       under the same terms as Perl itself, i.e., at your option, under the
       terms either of the "Artistic License" or the "GNU General Public
       License".
       The C library at the core of the module "Date::Calc::XS" can, at your
       discretion, also be used, modified and redistributed under the terms of
       the "GNU Library General Public License".
       Please refer to the files "Artistic.txt", "GNU_GPL.txt" and
       "GNU_LGPL.txt" in the "license" subdirectory of this distribution for
       any details!
DISCLAIMER
       This package is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
       WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
       MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
       See the "GNU General Public License" for more details.
POD ERRORS
       Hey! The above document had some coding errors, which are explained
       below:
       Around line 1761:
           Non-ASCII character seen before =encoding in 'Francais'. Assuming
           ISO8859-1

perl v5.16.3                      2009-10-31                     Date::Calc(3)