date:seconds

Returns the number of seconds specified by the argument string (a date/time or duration). If the argument is a date/time then the function returns the time difference in seconds between the date/time and 1970-01-01T00:00:00Z. If no argument is given, then the current local date/time is used as the default argument, and so the function returns the number of seconds since 1 Jan 1970. A duration argument (in days, hours, minutes, and seconds) is converted into seconds.

seconds($input as string?) ➔ number

Namespace

http://exslt.org/dates-and-times

Links to specifications

EXSLT Dates and Times Module

Saxon availability

Requires Saxon-PE or Saxon-EE. Available for Java and C/C++ only (not .NET).

Notes on the Saxon implementation

The specifications of the EXSLT date-and-time handling functions have little to say about timezones. Saxon generally handles inputs with or without a timezone, and uses the XPath 2.0 concept of implicit timezone to interpret the meaning of dates/times without a timezone. The current date and time used by EXSLT functions is the same as that used by the XPath 2.0 current-dateTime() function.