Check if todays date is between two other dates

Question

I am trying to check if todays date is between START and STOP date of a period, Winter, summer, spring etc..

and if the todays date is between, lets say.. the winter per

Answer 1

If you use DateTime object—which is by far the best approach—you are able to compare these with the regular comparators, e.g.:

$date1 = new DateTime('today');
$date2 = new DateTime('2014-04-04');

if ($date1 < $date2) echo 'Past';
else if ($date1 == $date2) echo 'Present';
else echo 'Future';

See documentation: http://php.net/manual/en/datetime.diff.php#example-2368