Convert number of seconds to time

Question

Is there a way to convert the number of seconds (e.g. 3056144 sec, this is time delta not a time) to time in format YYYY-mm-dd HH:MM:SS?

I've tried to convert number of seconds to struct tm using localtime and then substract UNIX start time (1970-01-01), but this is not working as expected.

Thanks in advance.

P.S. I have to use C++03, not C++11.

Answer 1

If using Boost.Date_Time is an option for you, this might be what you're looking for:

#include <boost/date_time.hpp>

using boost::posix_time::seconds;
using boost::posix_time::to_simple_string;

std::cout << to_simple_string(seconds(3056144)) << std::endl;

This will print:

848:55:44

However, as you can see in the output above, it will not tell you how many years have passed. This is for good reason, because a year has not always 365 days.