If I want to get the 12/1/2015
from the below string and store it in a variable
The string is 12/1/2016 5:03:36 PM: going home after work
$inputDate = "12/1/2015 5:03:36 PM";
$outputDate = date('n/j/Y',strtotime($inputDate));
For more info on PHP dates visit http://php.net/manual/en/function.date.php
$yourString = '12/1/2016 5:03:36 PM: going home after work';
$explodeStr = explode(" ", $yourString);
echo $explodeStr[0]; //prints 12/1/2016
you can use explode
to achieve it.