Python - checking for characters in date string
Question: I'm just kind of confused with Python at the moment. I want to ask the user to
input the date in a specific format. But I also want to check if there are two
"/" in the input. Ex: MM/DD/YYYY.... or else I would output an error message.

This is what I have so far:

    
    
    date = str((raw_input("Please enter a date in the form MM/DD/YYYY: ")))
    while date[(2),(5)]!="/":
        date_input=(str(raw_input("Error: Your date must be in the format YYYY/MM/DD including the slashes, try again: ")))
    

But I'm pretty stuck. Can anyone help me? Thanks.


Answer: Use `datetime.strptime` to parse the date, and it will tell you when the
format is wrong:

    
    
    import datetime
    d = datetime.datetime.now()
    try:
        d.strptime(date_str, "%d/%m/%Y")
    except ValueError:
        print "Bad format!"
    

