Convert Excel s 41014 date to actual date in PHP or JavaScript

Question

I'm developing a PHP/Jquery application that enables users to upload Excel spreadsheets directly from Excel. The values from each cell in the spreadsheet are then assigned to a variable, however for some reason, I'm having trouble with dates. In Excel, any date is entered as a number rather than 04/15/2012, such as 41014. (as if I were to format it in Excel as text).

How can I change this to the same YYYY-MM-DD format as the other data in the MySQL database I'm working with? I can accomplish it in PHP or jQuery, but jQuery seems to be more user-friendly.

Excel's Cell

04/15/2012

PHP's echo json_encode($var);

`{dateReceived: 41014}`

jQuery's console.log(dateReceived);

41014

Answer 1

PHPExcel Date handling code:

public static function ExcelToPHP($dateValue = 0) {
    if (self::$ExcelBaseDate == self::CALENDAR_WINDOWS_1900) {
        $myExcelBaseDate = 25569;
        //    Adjust for the spurious 29-Feb-1900 (Day 60)
        if ($dateValue < 60) {
            --$myExcelBaseDate;
        }
    } else {
        $myExcelBaseDate = 24107;
    }

    // Perform conversion
    if ($dateValue >= 1) {
        $utcDays = $dateValue - $myExcelBaseDate;
        $returnValue = round($utcDays * 86400);
        if (($returnValue <= PHP_INT_MAX) && ($returnValue >= -PHP_INT_MAX)) {
            $returnValue = (integer) $returnValue;
        }
    } else {
        $hours = round($dateValue * 24);
        $mins = round($dateValue * 1440) - round($hours * 60);
        $secs = round($dateValue * 86400) - round($hours * 3600) - round($mins * 60);
        $returnValue = (integer) gmmktime($hours, $mins, $secs);
    }

    // Return
    return $returnValue;
}    //    function ExcelToPHP()

If you want a PHP DateTime object instead:

public static function ExcelToPHPObject($dateValue = 0) {
    $dateTime = self::ExcelToPHP($dateValue);
    $days = floor($dateTime / 86400);
    $time = round((($dateTime / 86400) - $days) * 86400);
    $hours = round($time / 3600);
    $minutes = round($time / 60) - ($hours * 60);
    $seconds = round($time) - ($hours * 3600) - ($minutes * 60);

    $dateObj = date_create('1-Jan-1970+'.$days.' days');
    $dateObj->setTime($hours,$minutes,$seconds);

    return $dateObj;
}    //    function ExcelToPHPObject()