Flex "Verbal Month" date

Posted on Mar 24, 2009
Hi All,
If you are working with Adobe flex, you probably know that the framework does not have a function such as DateTime.Now().ToString().
Because of that, displaying a friendly date to the user is impossible unless you write a small extension to the getDate() function in flex.
This is the way to go
<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 2:</span></pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 3:</span> <span style="color: #0000ff;">private</span> function INIT():<span style="color: #0000ff;">void</span>{</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 4:</span>     getCurrentDate();</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 5:</span> }</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 6:</span></pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 7:</span> <span style="color: #0000ff;">private</span> var monthLabels:Array = <span style="color: #0000ff;">new</span> Array(<span style="color: #006080;">"Jan"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 8:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Feb"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 9:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Mar"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 10:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Apr"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 11:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"May"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 12:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Jun"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 13:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Jul"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 14:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Aug"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 15:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Sep"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 16:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Oct"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 17:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Nov"</span>,</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 18:</span>                                           <span style="color: #006080;">"Dec"</span>);</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 19:</span></pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 20:</span> <span style="color: #0000ff;">private</span> function getCurrentDate():<span style="color: #0000ff;">void</span>{</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 21:</span>     var date:Date = <span style="color: #0000ff;">new</span> Date();</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 22:</span>     todayDate = date.getDate().toString() + <span style="color: #006080;">" "</span> + monthLabels[date.getMonth()].toString() + <span style="color: #006080;">" "</span> + date.getFullYear().toString();</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: white;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 23:</span>     datePickerButton.label=todayDate;</pre>

<pre style="padding: 0px; font-size: 8pt; margin: 0em; overflow: visible; width: 100%; color: black; border-style: none; line-height: 12pt; font-family: consolas,'Courier New',courier,monospace; background-color: #f4f4f4;"><span style="color: #606060;"> 24:</span> }</pre>
That’s it, it’s that easy to get a date from flex.
You can of course extend it some more in order to get the day.