VB & VBA in a Nutshell: The Language

Now Function

Syntax

Now

Return Value

A Variant of subtype Date.

Description

Returns the current date and time based on the system setting.

Example

The following example returns the date 10 days from today:

Dim dFutureDate As Date
dFutureDate = DateAdd("d",10,Now)

Programming Tips and Gotchas

• It's often overlooked that workstations in a modern Windows environment are at the mercy of the user! If your application relies on an accurate date and time setting, you should consider including a line in the workstation's logon script to synchronize the time with one of the servers. Many so-called bugs have been traced to a workstation that has had its date or time wrongly altered by the user. The following line of code, when added to the logon script of an NT4 machine, synchronizes the machine's clock with that of a server called NTSERV1:

  net time \\NTSERV1 /set

• The date returned by Now takes the Windows General Date format based on the locale settings of the local computer. The U.S. setting for General Date is mm/dd/yy hh:mm:ss.

• The Now function is often used to generate timestamps. However, for short-term timing and intra-day timestamps, the Timer function, which returns the number of milliseconds elapsed since midnight, affords greater accuracy.

See Also

Timer Function