Convert a date in Excel from one format to another

Question

How would I convert a format like this in Excel:

01.06.2007 21:48:16

To this:

Sat Jan 06 21:48:16 EDT 2007?

Assume these are US dates, so 01.06.2007 is actually Sat Jan 06 2007 and all my source cells are EDT.

Answer 1

There aren't really any good date conversion functions in Excel, like there are in SQL, so you have to use some MID() selections.

Cell A1:

01.06.2007 21:48:16

Convert the date to ISO format and convert it to an Excel date serial, convert the time to an Excel time serial then add them together:

Cell A2:

=DATEVALUE(MID(A1,7,4)&"-"&MID(A1,1,2)&"-"&MID(A1,4,2))+TIMEVALUE(MID(A1,12,8))

Now you need to format the cell to get the date format you want: ddd mmm dd hh:mm:ss "EDT" yyyy

If you need to offset the original date and time, then add or subtract from the formula in A2; this example will add 2 hours to the original:

=DATEVALUE(MID(A1,7,4)&"-"&MID(A1,1,2)&"-"&MID(A1,4,2))+TIMEVALUE(MID(A1,12,8))+TIMEVALUE("2:00:00")

Result:

Sat Jan 06 23:48:16 EDT 2007