Custom start and end date of a period (eg pay period form May/26/2022 - June/25/2022)

[paulg]

Hi there,

I am a new comer and just got started with PowerApps.

My problem: 

I got a timesheet app template from @aprildunnam. I would like to have customized pay periods so that it starts on the 26th of a month and end 25th of the following month.

E.g. StartDate: May/26/2022

     EndDate: June/25/2022

I would like a user to be able to select a period from the dropdown like: 

May/26/2022 - June/25/2022

June/26/2022 - July/25/2022

July/26/2022 - August/25/2022, etc.

How do I go about creating those custom (and fixed) start/ end dates.

Thanks.

[WarrenBelz · Accepted solution]

Hi @paulg ,

Items of your Combo Box (change Today() if you want to start another time and 20 to whatever number of items you want to display).

With(
   {
      wPays: 
      ForAll(
         Sequence(20),
         {
            Period1: 
            DateAdd(
               Today(),
               Value,
               Months
            ),
            Period2: 
            DateAdd(
               Today(),
               Value + 1,
               Months
            )
         }
      )
   },
   ShowColumns(
      AddColumns(
         wPays,
         "Choices",
         Text(
            DateValue(Month(Period1) & "/26/" & Year(Period1)),
            "mmmm/dd/yyyy"
         ) & " - " & 
         Text(
            DateValue(Month(Period2) & "/25/" & Year(Period2)),
            "mmmm/dd/yyyy"
         )
      ),
      "Choices"
   )
)

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[paulg]

Hi @WarrenBelz ,Thanks. This would help, however,  it doesn't produce a fixed date for Period1(start date) and Period2(end date)

I would want Period1 and Period2 to always be 26th and 25th of some month, while the month keeps updating. This is because I may need to reference Period1/period2 independently instead of the concatenated "Choice" column.

I tried to add them as columns but they are set to Today(). How do I make them set to month/26/year and month/25/year?

Any further guidance is much appreciated.

[WarrenBelz]

@paulg ,

I thought I provided exactly what you asked in the post (took a while to build a model to do it)

I would like a user to be able to select a period from the dropdown like: 

May/26/2022 - June/25/2022

June/26/2022 - July/25/2022

July/26/2022 - August/25/2022, etc.

If you want to change the start date, just use

DateAdd(
   Today(),
   xxx,
   Months
)

in lieu of today.

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[paulg]

Thanks @WarrenBelz . Your response actually fixed my original problem. But looks like I had more that I wanted to learn.

[paulg]

Hi @WarrenBelz ,

Help me understand what the "Value" means in the DateAdd function.

E.g. in:

DateAdd(
Today(), Value, Months
)

My little understanding so far is that there should be a number in place of value, Or, we can use  Value function to convert text to a number. 

My apologies if this sounds like a lazy question.

Thanks

[WarrenBelz]

@paulg ,

Value in this case is the numeric output of the Sequence function, so it starts at 1 and increases by 1 each loop until 20.

[paulg]

Hi @WarrenBelz , You helped me solve this problem sometime, however, I need more help.

I have a drop down where the start date is selected (e.g. Aug/5/2022) and I want to calculate a 1-month period end date (e.g Sept/4/2022) based on the start date.

I tried the DateAdd(StartDate, 1, Months) but it gives me Sept/5th  instead of Sept/4th in this case. Also, adding on 30 days doesn't work since not all months have 30 days.

How best can I handle this? 

Thanks,

Forgive me about this. Am still new with PowerApps. 

[WarrenBelz]

Hi @paulg ,

I am not sure why you are getting that (see below) - today is Saturday 6th August here.

however, this is the "long way"

With(
   {wNext: Month(Today()) = 12},
   DateValue(
      If(
         wNext,
         1,
         Month(Today()) + 1
      ) & "/" & 
      Day(Today()) & "/" & 
      Year(Today()) + 
      If(
         wNext,
         1
      )
   )
)

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