# Which is the best way for comparing dates?

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-is-the-best-way-for-comparing-dates/160290>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [February 13, 2009, 7:42pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-is-the-best-way-for-comparing-dates/160290 "2009-02-13T19:42:35Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/f04885/32.png) [@captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/captaffy)\
**Post date:** [February 13, 2009, 7:42pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-is-the-best-way-for-comparing-dates/160290/1 "2009-02-13T19:42:35Z")

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Is it correct to do this?  
if @date\_a \> @date\_b  
puts ‘hi’  
end

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**Author:** ![captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/f04885/32.png) [@captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/captaffy)\
**Post date:** [February 13, 2009, 7:54pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-is-the-best-way-for-comparing-dates/160290/2 "2009-02-13T19:54:29Z")

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On 13 Feb 2009, at 18:42, John S. wrote:

> Is it correct to do this?  
> if @date\_a \> @date\_b  
> puts ‘hi’  
> end

assuming those are both instances of Date, (or Time etc.) then yes.  
Ruby won’t let you compare an instance of Date with a Time instance,  
and equally funny things will happen if either (or both) of those are  
string representations of the dates.

Fred

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**Author:** ![captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/f04885/32.png) [@captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/captaffy)\
**Post date:** [February 13, 2009, 8:42pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-is-the-best-way-for-comparing-dates/160290/3 "2009-02-13T20:42:46Z")

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Thanks Fred. Those ones are the updated\_at rows of two different tables.

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**Author:** ![captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/f04885/32.png) [@captaffy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/captaffy)\
**Post date:** [February 14, 2009, 8:24am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/which-is-the-best-way-for-comparing-dates/160290/4 "2009-02-14T08:24:19Z")

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I think you’ll be good to go with that one.

On Feb 13, 1:42 pm, John S. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)