First up, a recipe to get the current date and time:Adding DateInterval gives one hour off answer in the Azores. 0, PHP 7, PHP 8) DateTime::add-- date_add — Modifica um objeto DateTime, com adição de dias, meses, anos, horas, minutos e segundos. For an example,. invert. My goal was to create a list of times between like 10:00 and 14:00 with 15 minute intervals. Find centralized, trusted content and collaborate around the technologies you use most. So, one way to do this is to substract the time from Carbon first and then calculate diff. ,It looks like PHP 5. Do the same for the second date this time geting the last day of the week with "next saturday" (or sunday); Get both dates W and make a mysql comparison between the weeks. you can check the 'invert' property to see if the second date is before the first date or not. PHP Manual - DatePeriod. What is the simplest way to get the difference in days between two PHP DateTimes, considering midnight as a day change (just like the DATEDIFF(DAY) SQL function does)?. $timezone = new DateTimeZone('America/New_York'); $date1 = new DateTime (date("Y:m:d H:i:s", time()), $timezone); $date1->add(new DateInterval. The value for DateInterval could be changed In 'PT24H'. The date time format I have is: 2011-11-17 05:05: year-month-day hour:minute. For example, you can add 10 minutes to 31 December 1999 23:55, and DateAdd automatically recalculates all elements of the date to return a valid date, in this case 1 January 2000 00:05. However, the days property of the DateInterval object seems to be broken in the current PHP5. This function accepts an interval and a format string as parameters and, formats the given interval in the specified format. . DateInterval is only a "length" without a start and end date, as oppose to DatePeriod. You can use the DateTime object in PHP to subtract one month from a date formatted with date ('m-Y'). 2. It looks like PHP 5. First, follow their installation instructions. This code starts every week on a thursday and ends on a wednesday. $newTime = $current->format('Y. You linked to the DateTime::add function, which takes the parameter of DateInterval whose doc then says to refer to the formats supported by the DateTime constructor which then points to "Date and Time Formats" which then links to "Time Formats", "Date Formats", "Compound. これは、日付間隔を表す PHP のクラスです。また、入力文字列を受け入れ、入力文字列から DateInterval を設定する静的メソッドも提供します。 DateInterval() の構文 The DateInterval class ¶ (PHP 5 >= 5. php dateinterval add hours minute add to time in php add 1 hour php DateInterval add 1 hour to date php hours minutes seconds php php add hour from a date php add 1. 2. I have this string object in my php array "2013-03-05 00:00:00+00" I would like to add 12 hours to the entry within PHP, then save it back to string in the same format. 2 the DateTime () class were introduced. So returning UTC is required. DateInterval::invert will. Here, H represents the hours in 24-hour format (00 through 23), i represents the minutes (00 to 59), and s represents the seconds (00 through 59), all with leading zeros. The behaviour with PT1H is now correct:. . 25. The W3Schools online code editor allows you to edit code and view the result in your browserA Computer Science portal for geeks. As stated in the documentation to DateInterval::format The DateInterval::format() method does not recalculate carry over points in time strings nor in date segments. Next, you’ll subtract the specified interval from the given DateTime object by using the sub () functio n. this would be really straightforward if it was limited to days or hours - but it needs to support months, which can have variable lengths. PHP: DateInterval # Adds 7 days to the project launch. As stated in the documentation to DateInterval::format The DateInterval::format() method does not recalculate carry over points in time strings nor in date segments. Véase DateInterval::format(). Minutes to add will just be a number between 0 and 59Adding Days to a Date with PHP DateInterval. How to add an hour onto the time of this datetime string?, DateTime/DateInterval adding 25 hours each refresh gives a completely different result, Add one hour to PHP variable with date [duplicate], Adding 1 hour to time variable W3Schools offers free online tutorials, references and exercises in all the major languages of the web. Represents a date interval. Like DateTimeImmutable::add() but works with DateTime . PHP DateInterval: Diff between same date in two different months is not one month. But with a DatePeriod it makes sense. 0. I've read the documentation and don't quite understand how it works. (decimal point). See Also. Just to expand on previous answers, a function to do this could work like this (changing the time and interval formats however you like them according to this for function. More specifically, the information in an object of the DateInterval class is an instruction to get from one date/time to another date/time. To format DateTimeImmutable and DateTime objects, please refer to the documentation of the DateTimeInterface::format () method. @niceman Nope, date_diff doesn't work (date_diff() expects parameter 1 to be DateTimeInterface, object given) and date_create() doesnt works too (not accepting normal nor formated dates of type DateInterval)(PHP 5 >= 5. Share. [PDF] A Comprehensive Guide to REDCap Project approvals will generally be granted within 1–2 business days (24–48 hours) of the request. What MySQL datatype to store a PHP DateInterval. days: If the DateInterval object was created by DateTime::diff(), then this is the total number of days between the start and end dates. A PHP dateinterval represents a date interval as a storage structure for time which is accompanied by various components like objects and functions for implementation. I believe this involves converting the string to a date object. As stated in the documentation to DateInterval::format The DateInterval::format() method does not recalculate carry over points in time strings nor in date segments. Jun 9, 2017 at 20:24. I believe this involves converting the string to a date object. 3, I suppose any such conversion function would know how many seconds are in a year, a month, a day, an hour, and a minute. itself is not changed in the calling program. I'm really stuck with adding X minutes to a datetime, after doing lots of google'ing and PHP manual reading, I don't seem to be getting anywhere. 3 is as expected. Not as compact as if you did convert it to one unit of time and store it as an int, but much more compact than serializing the DateInterval object and storing the whole thing. The Overflow BlogPT2H30M — 2 Hour and 30 minutes. ,You can also define a single string pattern if you want, using [] to delimiter the optional sections:,The first is harder, but maybe there is a trick with one of the many string-to-date converters in PHP?1 hour - 3600; 1 day - 86400 (24 hours) 1 week - 604800 (7 days) 1 month - 2419200 (4 weeks) Share. Valor Retornado. interval A DateInterval object Return Values ¶ Returns the modified DateTime object for method chaining. Stack Overflow Public questions & answers; Stack Overflow for Teams Where developers & technologists share private knowledge with coworkers; Talent Build your employer brand ; Advertising Reach developers & technologists worldwide; Labs The future of collective knowledge sharing; About the companyLearn PHP - Add or Subtract Date Intervals. If you can't use 5. PHP DateInterval does not applied on DateTime object. You can use DatePeriod together with DateInterval to achieve this. 1. PHP DateInterval: Diff between same date in two different months is not one month. 2. I have a PHP variable that says: 07/05/2016. 93, then follow the top example. And I don't mean by just a couple seconds like one would expect, I mean lots of minutes. 3's DateInterval supports this. DateTime "first day of last month" not returning the first day. Example #1 DateTimeImmutable::add/sub add intervals which cover elapsed time Adding PT24H over a DST transition will appear to add 23/25 hours (for most timezones). In the end, you’ll print the subtracted DateTime object. It also provides the static method, which accepts the input strings and sets up a DateInterval from the input string. Now that we now how to specify date intervals, we will learn how to add days to a date in PHP. See DateInterval::format () . – J Weezy. Also think about Days,. PHP provides a set of date and time classes that allow you to work with the date and time in an object-oriented way. Thanks again – Eric Evans. This is what I tried first and days cannot be set when the interval is created from diff, that's why we currently have the exception 'Can not instance a DateInterval object created from DateTime::diff(). This is an end result. $string = '1/1/2016 11. I am creating an online booking system. Notas. I'm talking about two issues: (1) the number of days in the month which varies from months 1-12 as well as for month 2 which could be leap year (or not); and then issue (2): what if there is the need to specify a large. . If the duration contains time elements, that portion of the specification is preceded by the letter T. Last day of previous months calculating wrong. Return Value: Returns a DateTime object on success. Here is my attempt to add an hour onto it: $time = 'Tue May 15 10:14:30 +0000 2012'; $dt = new DateTime ($time); $dt->add (new DateInterval ('P1h')); The DateInterval class ¶ (PHP 5 >= 5. We can use the class DateInterval to add or subtract some interval in a DateTime object. Excess =. . The date time format I have is: 2011-11-17 05:05: year-month-day hour:minute. " Each duration period is represented by an integer value followed by a period designator. DateTime::diff () - Returns the difference. Carbon's diff does not return a Carbon object, but a DateInterval object. Try adding a call to date_default_timezone_set() to the top of your script and work in UTC to eliminate local timezone issues. e. However, PHP 7. 5. To get the time different in two timestamps you can simply minus the first timestamp from the second. The code can be made shorter if you desire. You would need to remove the minutes and seconds from your date objects, as they are not relevant in the calculation, using DateTime::setTime(date->format('H'), 0) . It uses the "natural" order of the variables in php DateInterval class. [2010-07-29 09:15 UTC] rasmus@php. I don't want to use cron on Linux/Unix/BSD box or Scheduled Tasks on Windows. These are the top rated real world PHP examples of DateInterval extracted from open source projects. Ein DateInterval-Objekt Rückgabewerte. . Is 1 if the interval represents a negative time period and 0 otherwise. 1. A common way to create a DateInterval object is by calculating the difference between two date/time objects through DateTimeInterface::diff(). Hier ist ein Beispiel, das zeigt, wie einfach es ist, Datums- und Uhrzeitangaben in PHP hinzuzufügen oder zu subtrahieren. A value containing a date and time value to which a specified time interval has been added. Method compare makes a value comparison. What this means is that whenever you'd modify a DateTime the same instance will be changed, but when you modify a DateTimeImmutable a new modified instance will be return instead. 3. The date_diff() is an inbuilt function in PHP which is used to calculate the difference between two dates. 2. days. Stack Overflow Public questions & answers; Stack Overflow for Teams Where developers & technologists share private knowledge with coworkers; Talent Build your employer brand ; Advertising Reach developers & technologists worldwide; Labs The future of collective knowledge sharing; About the companyPHP Collective Join the discussion This question is in a collective: a subcommunity defined by tags with relevant content and experts. Part of PHP Collective. Here we are using DateTime and DateInterval for getting desired output. B. net has a few comparisons between. PHP で日付を追加するための. Here is an example: This will output "12-2021". A one-liner option is: echo date_create('2011-04-24')->modify('-1 days')->format('Y-m-d'); Running it on Online PHP Editor. I guessed it meant period and I was searching php. Return Value: This function returns the. get php DateInterval in total 'minutes' 0. To specify we have to use some standards which are listed here. here's what I was going to say: (php 5 >= 5. FALSE on failure: PHP Version:There are no user contributed notes for this page. GetDecimalValue (), 2) IF FixEncodedHours > 8 then. PHP Collective Join the discussion. logos-php at kith dot org. 3. PHP 2022-03-28 00:30:23 php move index of a value to first position in array PHP 2022-03-28 00:25:01 wordpress get_date PHP 2022-03-27 23:30:38 php shorten string with dotsTo expand on the solution provided by Dave and the solution provided by Guss. Jun 12, 2009 at 10:45. Two days is P2D. Below programs illustrate the date. Improve this question. @pospi Ok, but then I still feel that there is a confusion around DateInterval and DatePeriod. I can easily trim the number of decimals by adjusting the string length parameter; here I use 4 to get milliseconds, but you could use 7 to get. <?phpIf I add 1 minute, it still adds an extra hour. The constructor for this class accepts the specified interval as a string which starts with P. 3 build (at least on Windows, it always returns the same 6015 value). I used: composer require league/oauth2-server openssl genrsa -out private. In order to compare those two dates we use the method diff() of the first. By default, the date is displayed by applying the default timezone (the one specified in php. It should actually be: 25:25The DateAdd function has a built-in calendar algorithm to prevent it from returning an invalid date. 48. W3Schools offers free online tutorials, references and exercises in all the major languages of the web. The procedural version takes the DateTime object as its first argument. Calculate the interval between two dates, then format the interval: <?php $date1=date_create ("2013-01-01"); $date2=date_create ("2013-02-10"); $diff=date_diff. We can use it to get the current year, current month, current hour, etc. 5. php; Share. The idea is to. Relative format listing of DateInterval::createFromDateString also does not mention any fraction of a sec. 2. The next addition makes it go from 2 to 3, but as 3:00 only exists as non-DST, the UTC offset than changes. The Overflow BlogCurrently my code is adding a week, but I'm using Days instead of Weeks. If I chose 05 Aug 2015 as start date and 17 Oct 2015 as end date, then my array output should be divided in 3 arrays: 1st array for 05 Aug 2015 - 31 Aug 2015; 2nd array for 01 Sept 2015 - 30 Sept 2015;June 23, 2022. Then I looping over every real DateInterval while performing an compound assignment operation (for example +=) on the desired property. net for that word, I obviously never got to the constructor page. In effect you are telling php to create a period of 1 hour between the two dates, within 1 second of time. I always like to drop in some sort of timezone declaration to make things definitive. , ChatGPT) is banned. そこで、この記事では、 DateTime クラスの. 0, PHP 7, PHP 8) DateTime::sub-- date_sub — Subtracts an amount of days, months, years, hours, minutes and seconds from a DateTime object Description. Dim OvertimeLimit As Decimal = 4D. El método DateInterval::format() no recalcula los excesos en cadenas de hora ni en segmentos de fecha. Return Value : This function returns a DateTime. There's DateInterval though, which handles date intervals. No, this is not possible right now and it never will be. I also attempted to do it in a way which would fail to preserve number. Esto es así porque no es posible analizar valores como "32 días" el cual podría ser interpretado como cualquier cosa. Featured on MetaI have extended the php class. 7 it adds 1 to the hour to make it go from 1 to 2, without being tipped up by the DST transition. 00PM'; $date = new DateTime ($string); $interval = new DateInterval ('PT6H'); $date. In the advance PHP object oriented style for all date & time calculations this format is useful. and two wrongs will happily make one right). Date and time manipulation is an unavoidable part of programming; there will inevitably be a part of a project that requires a date to be modified. Parameters. Real mails from my inbox. Add 30 minutes in specified time. DateTime is an awesome feature in PHP. Converting INT minutes to HOUR in SQL server. php date next month gives wrong day. From manual: DateTime::add -- date_add — Adds an amount of days, months, years, hours, minutes and seconds to a DateTime object. If I add 1 month it will just add 1 on the month part and leave the day part (2011-01-15 will become 2011-02-15) If the day is not existing in the month we will end, we take the last existing day of it (2011-01-30 will become 2011-02-28)Method 1: Using date_diff () Function. So, there are same moment will return 0. And I don't mean by just a couple seconds like one would expect, I mean lots of minutes. You can rate examples to help us improve the quality of examples. The DateInterval::format() method does not recalculate carry over points in time strings nor in date segments. Distribute a month in weeks with start and end dates array. This is expected because it is not possible to overflow values like "32 days" which could be interpreted as anything from "1 month and 4 days" to "1 month and 1 day". Then, when converting from seconds, it would divide in that order, each time taking the modulo of the previous operation, until only <60. How to add 25 minutes in 2 hours-1. Program 2: This program uses DateTime::sub () function to subtract the given interval from date object. A date with relative parts. Why does date object diff on month reset to 0 after 12 months?You've answered the first question, you either need to modify('+1') or to initialize next saturday to include the last day. This function is used to find the difference between two dates. We will further analyze their implementations. This form element takes in 8601 Duration Strings or PHP DateInterval objects as its value/default value, and outputs PHP DateInterval objects upon form submission. They will receive two different dates in their constructors. Examples with filter:Possible Duplicate: Get timestamp of today and yesterday in php I was wondering if there was a simple way of getting yesterday's date through this format: date("F j, Y");``` Dates in the m/d/y or d-m-y formats are disambiguated by looking at the separator between the various components: if the separator is a slash (/), then the American m/d/y is assumed; whereas if the separator is a dash (-) or a dot (. Syntax:If you want it to be something very close to 1, ~0. If unsure, FIRST call date_default_timezone_set with the timezone name that corresponds to the source of your date strings. Sorted by: 4. So, the P2W is equal to “2 weeks“, P1D is equal to “1 day“, PT36S is equal to “36 seconds“, etc. 1,945 1 1 gold badge 19 19 silver badges 29 29 bronze badges 1 Note that in all of these answers, you are getting GMT (or UTC or whatever you want to call it) time. [2012-05-05 20:45 UTC] php at arjanonline dot net Description: ----- When I create a DateTime object from a (any) timestamp and then add a DateInterval object to the DateTime object, the time in the DateInterval object is added and one additional hour is. net I don't see why I can't reproduce it then. 3. You can't use date to substract or add days (hours, minutes etc. I get the start of this event and the duration to add to get the end. The output when running the above code in PHP 8. PHP date next tuesday 1pm. Today we’re going to dissect the PHP DateInterval class, a power tool for dealing with dates in a web app. I wanted to. I'm really stuck with adding X minutes to a datetime, after doing lots of google'ing and PHP manual reading, I don't seem to be getting anywhere. and massively easier and less hack-y than the "old" way of handling dates. Example #1 DateTimeImmutable::add/sub add intervals which cover elapsed time Adding PT24H over a DST transition will appear to add 23/25 hours (for most timezones). 0. PHP date interval format() Function - The date_interval_format() function is an alias of DateInterval::format(). Hot Network Questions A question of random points in a square and probability of intersection of their line segmentsFloating point number stores fraction value. Changelog. 6. I don't want to use cron on Linux/Unix/BSD box or Scheduled Tasks on Windows. . C# (CSharp) DateInterval - 60 examples found. 0, PHP 7, PHP 8). Return Value: Returns a DateTime object on success. Possibility to store a duration/time in a mysql datetime field. DateTime::add — Adds an amount of days, months, years, hours, minutes and seconds to a DateTime object. DatePeriod::getRecurrences — Gets the number of recurrences. Minute, dtpTimeIn. If I use Pacific/Honolulu or UTC in date_default_timezone_set() it works fine. 400 seconds. DateTime::setTime — Legt die Uhrzeit fest. Follow edited Jul 28 at 15:50. 0. epoch time), a DateTime object, and a string. Previous SQL Server Functions Next . 0. In the advance PHP object oriented style for all date & time calculations this format is useful. )。. But it is more readable like that. Ah thanks, by time element you are referring to time on a clock as opposed to days, from a comment in the docs: "To resolve ambiguity, "P1M" is a one-month duration and "PT1M" is a one-minute duration (note the time. 3D P1DT1. The next addition makes it go from 2 to 3, but as 3:00 only exists as non-DST,. DateTime::__construct — Returns new DateTime object. js, Node. I am trying to calculate all the hours from start to end which I was able to do, but I need to display the hours in intervals. Date/Time Arithmetic. xxxxxxxxxx. 0. I'm talking about two issues: (1) the number of days in the month which varies from months 1-12 as well as for month 2 which could be leap year (or not); and then issue (2): what if there is the need to specify a large. Regarding PHP 5. 2,459 1 1 gold badge 15 15 silver badges 26 26 bronze badges 1 Thanks, in my case it was definitely necessary to cut off seconds, as I do some more time based calculations and rely on proper DateInterval objects. Es 1 si el intervalo representa un periodo de tiempo negativo y 0 si no. The DateInterval object represents the difference between the two dates. One easy way to get the number of days is to create a DateTime at zero time, add the interval to it, and then get the resulting timestamp: Modifies the specified DateTime object, by subtracting the specified DateInterval object. In 8. The DATE_ADD function takes two arguments: start_date is a starting DATE or DATETIME value. What you can do with this function/method is a great example of the philosophy: "just because you can do it doesn't mean you should". 4. Two seconds is PT2S. There are two ways to obtain the date and time in PHP. The DateInterval constructor accepts. How To's. This article demonstrates how to get the time difference between two dates in minutes in PHP. I'm seeing a very strange behavior with DateTime and DateInterval objects, and wanted to know why it was behaving this way. H is the hour designator that follows the value for the number of hours. This, ladies and gentlemen, was one instanceDateInterval can be used to create a new dateinterval object for our date calculation and uses in any script. The individual occasionally clicks a wrong button, realises the problem quickly and makes a. One thing to know is that the dates and times can be represented in three forms: a timestamp (i. There's DateInterval though, which handles date intervals. DateInterval::createFromDateString. This P stands for the period. glad that it helped :) – macghriogair. interval 1: 03:05 interval 2: 05:00 Total interval : 08:05 Instead you need to create a new DateTime object, then use the add function to add the intervals and finally display the difference to the reference point:PHP Collective Join the discussion This question is in a collective: a subcommunity defined by tags with relevant content and experts. DateInterval::format () - Formats the interval. During daylight savings changes 24 hours is not the same as 1 day, which PHP will arrange for you with the proper timezone configuration. PHP: define start date for interval. The title says it all. DatePeriod::getEndDate — Gets the end date. 0 but DateInterval as well as some DateTime methods are not available prior to 5. 2 meant using date (), strtotime (), and other date related functions sometimes in convoluted ways to get to the date (s) you were looking for. This is expected because it is not possible to overflow values like "32 days" which could be interpreted as anything from "1 month and 4 days" to "1 month and 1. Syntax: DateInterval DatePeriod::getDateInterval ( void ) Parameters: This function does not accept any parameters. Qiita Blog. This function returns a new DateTime object. Alternatively, you can use the static createFromDateString() method, which takes as an argument an English relative date string in the same way as strtotime() function does. Converting seconds into period of time. 3. This is an end result. I also attempted to do it in a way which would fail to preserve number. (one with decimal point) then the data type of a variable is considered as double. Covering popular subjects like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Python, SQL, Java, and many, many more. Use it or do some manual calculation. Output: 00-0-1 22:0:0 In this example we created two DateTime objects. DateTime::createFromFormat — Parses a time string according to a specified format. I may convert the values of hours, minutes and seconds to zeroes. 0. VB. It is the most modern method for handling datetime and doesn't require any calculation of minutes & seconds. This function will return a DateInterval object on the success and returns FALSE on failure. So it's pretty simple. 123456 sec? interval_spec of DateInterval::__construct. While, on the surface, echoing a date in the future brings a small bit of accomplishment, it can be quickly eradicated when one is tasked with. Below programs illustrate the DateTime::sub () function in PHP: Program 1: This program uses DateTime::sub () function to subtract 2 days from given date object. What you are talking about is unixtime. If you prefer to avoid using string methods, or going into calculations, or even creating additional variables, mktime supports subtraction and negative values in the following way: Stack Overflow Public questions & answers; Stack Overflow for Teams Where developers & technologists share private knowledge with coworkers; Talent Build your employer brand I'm trying to create a simple function which returns me a date with a certain number of subtracted days from now, so something like this but I dont know the date classes well: <? function Add 2 days to the current date in PHP; php date strtotime add days; php add 1 month to current date; php add days to date; php date add 5 seconds; how to add extra days from a date php; Add 5 days to the current date in PHP; php add one day to date; php add 1 day to date; add 1 day php datetime; php datetime sub minutes; PHP Date add days; php. It contains well written, well thought and well explained computer science and programming articles, quizzes and practice/competitive programming/company interview Questions. 0. Large collection of code snippets for HTML, CSS and JavaScript. ), then the European d-m-y format is assumed. But the. Constructors. DateInterval; PHP; I wanted to test an interval was being respected which required me to add a seconds-based interval value to a Carbon date object. PHP DateInterval does not applied on DateTime object. This is expected because it is not possible to overflow values like "32 days" which could be interpreted as anything from "1 month and 4 days" to "1 month and 1 day". my code is function my_last_login( ) { return 'j F Y H:i'; } it prints 21 october 2015 15:36 i want 21 october 2015 17. And it represents a date period. Constructing with the Constructor. 0. I am currently working at a system for a manufacturing company that monitors a daily output data, but the company follows a 24hours production duration which the date ends at 6:00 AM, but the standard PHP date/time change after 12:00 midnight,is it possible to change the PHP date/timestamp to change the current date after 6am?. PHP Fatal error: Call to a member function add() on a non-object. The most. I solve it for my case by creating a new stdClass, this object emulates a DateInterval object, however it is not a real DateInterval object. 5. Jun 9, 2017 at 20:25. A minute may span 59, 60, or 61 seconds, an hour may contain 3599, 3600, or 3601 seconds. A PHP dateinterval represents a date interval as a storage structure for time which is accompanied by various components like objects and functions for implementation. I tried to add +2 hours to date function visualization in php (wordpress). 0. PHP DateInterval: Diff between same date in two different months is not one month 3 Calculate months between two dates using DateInterval without wrapping within a yearMain PHP Function Online page. 6, the fraction is truncated. Sorry I may have overlooked your code but the only one missing in the result is "Mar 16 - Mar 22, 2017" in the first line. DateTime handles time-of-day, not time intervals. This is an alias for the constructor that allows better fluent syntax as it allows you to do ChronosInterval::create(1)->fn() rather than (new ChronosInterval(1))->fn(). This class can parse, manipulate and format dates. + add a note. 1. I guessed it meant period and I was searching php. DateTime::diff: Get the difference and use that to determine which is more ancient. 1). The problem in your code is that you are confusing the return object of diff. Otherwise.