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Python Dates and Times in Python (2014) Let's Build a Timed Quiz App Harder Time Machine

Asher Orr
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Asher Orr
Python Development Techdegree Graduate 9,410 Points

My function is not returning the right datetime object- can anyone help me?

Hi everyone!

My function, time_machine, takes an integer and a string of "minutes", "hours", "days", or "years". The parameters describe a timedelta, and I want to return a datetime object that is the timedelta's duration from the starter datetime.

Here's my code:

# Remember, you can't set "years" on a timedelta!
# Consider a year to be 365 days.

import datetime

starter = datetime.datetime(2015, 10, 21, 16, 29)

def time_machine(int_obj, time_unit):
    if time_unit == "minutes":
        delta = datetime.timedelta(minutes=int_obj)
    if time_unit == "hours":
        delta = datetime.timedelta(hours=int_obj)
    if time_unit == "days":
        delta = datetime.timedelta(days=int_obj)
    if time_unit == "years":
        delta = datetime.timedelta(days=int_obj/365)
    new_obj = starter + delta
    return new_obj

I keep getting an error that time_machine doesn't return the right datetime. I would appreciate any insights on why this is occurring.

For what it's worth, I thought it might be an issue with converting the "if time_unit == 'years'" statement. I tried using floor division to see if I could get a more precise number that the checker would accept, like this:

    if time_unit == "years":
        delta = datetime.timedelta(days=int_obj // 365)

But this hasn't worked either. Thank you for reading!

1 Answer

Mark Sebeck
MOD
Mark Sebeck
Treehouse Moderator 38,304 Points

Hi Asher. The good news is you are super close. And the issues is not related to your understanding of Python. For years you have -

days=int_obj/365

To set a year you want years * 365.