Python Time Module

Python has the module named time to deal with time-associated tasks. In this article, we are able to discover the time module in detail. We will discover ways to use the one-of-a-kind time-associated capabilities described withinside the time module. The Python time module affords many approaches of representing time withinside the code, which includes objects, numbers, and strings. It additionally affords capability apart from representing time, like ready all through the code execution and measuring the performance of the code.

python time image 1.1

If we want to use functions defined in the module, we need to import the module first.

from time import time

You can manage the concept of Python time in your application is by using the floating-point number that represents a number of seconds that have passed since the beginning of an era that is, since the particular starting point. Let’s go to that Epoch point.

Python time.time()

Let’s calculate the total seconds since the epoch.

# app.py 
from time import time 
seconds = time.time() 
print("Seconds since epoch =", seconds)

It returns a floating point value that represents the number of seconds that have passed since the epoch. The epoch is a a platform-dependent point where the time starts.

If you’re unsure what is the epoch on the system you’re using, use the gmtime() function. It takes one argument (a number of seconds) and converts the time to a struct. If you define the number as zero, it will simply display the beginning of the epoch:

print(time.gmtime(0))

Converting Python time

The gmtime() function returns the struct time in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). If you need it in local time, use localtime(). To get an opposite result, use mktime():

t = time.localtime(seconds)
print("The struct_time is:", t)

sec = time.mktime(t)
print("The number of seconds is:", sec)

If you need the Python time represented in a string, use asctime() (if you have a struct time) or cttime() (if you have a floating point value). Both of these functions will return a Python timestamp:

t = (2020, 1, 13, 13, 18, 9, 0, 3, 0)
date = time.asctime(t)

seconds = time.time()
date2 = time.ctime(seconds)

Using the Python time.sleep() function

The time module also allows you to time the execution of your threads. To delay a certain process, use the Python time.sleep() function:

print("Hello.")
time.sleep(3)
print("It's been three seconds since we said hello.")

You only need to define one argument, which is a floating-point number. It represents the number of seconds to delay the action for.

Using the Python time.sleep() function with a while loop, you can also create a basic digital clock:

while True:
  localtime = time.localtime()
  result = time.strftime("%I:%M:%S", localtime)
  print(result)
  time.sleep(1)

Python time: useful tips

1. There are two more Python modules that help you deal with time and date: calendar handles the calendar-related functions, and datetime lets you manipulate Python timestamps. You can also extend datetime withe the dateutil package from PyPI.
2. If you’re working with multithreaded programs, remember that the Python time.sleep() function only delays a single thread and not the whole process.