如何从 csv 获取日期列表（作为字符串）并仅返回开始日期和结束日期之间的日期/数据？

Question

I have a csv file with dates in format M/D/YYYY from 1948 to 2017. I'm able to plot other columns/lists associated with each date by list index. I want to be able to ask the user for a start date, and an end date, then return/plot the data from only within that period.

Problem is, reading dates in from the csv, they are strings so I cannot use if date[x] >= startDate && date[x] <= endDate because theres no way for me to turn dates in this format to integers.

Here is my csv file

I am already able to read in the dates from the csv to its own list.

How can I take the dates in my list and only return the ones within the user specified date range?

Here is my function for plotting the entire dataset right now:

#CSV Plotting function
def CSV_Plot (data,header,column1,column2):

  #pyplot.plot([item[column1] for item in data] , [item[column2] for item in data])
  pyplot.scatter([item[column1] for item in data] , [item[column2] for item in data])
  pyplot.xlabel(header[column1])
  pyplot.ylabel(header[column2])
  pyplot.show()

  return True

CSV_Plot(mycsvdata,data_header,dateIndex,rainIndex)

This is how I am asking the user to input the start and end dates:

 #Ask user for start date in M/D/YYY format
  startDate = input('Please provide the start date (M/D/YYYY) of the period for the data you would like to plot: ')
  endDate = input('Please provide the end date (M/D/YYYY) of the period for the data you would like to plot: ')

Answer 1

You need to compare the dates.

I would suggest parsing the dates from your CSV into a datetime object, and also turning the user input value into a datetime object.

How to create a datetime object from a string? You need to specify the format string and the strptime() will parse it for you. Details here: Converting string into datetime

In your case, it could be something like

from datetime import datetime

# Considering date is in M/D/YYYY format
datetime_object1 = datetime.strptime(date_string, "%m/%d/%Y")

Then you can compare them with a > or < operator. Here you can find details of how to compare the dates .