How to calculate difference in months between dates using IronPython Script in Spotfire®

Introduction

The following IronPython code shows how to calculate the difference in months between two dates passed by a property control. In the code, startDate and endDate receive the Document Properties values that are filled by two Input Property Controls. The result is stored in a Document Property for this example. I couldn't find an example of that (or something like this), so I thought I would share this. I hope it's useful. Has an attached .dxp file for better understanding.

Code Sample

# Input Property Control (Document Properties)
startDate = Document.Properties["inicialDate"]
endDate = Document.Properties["finalDate"]

# Converting date to string and then splitting it to capture the month and year to calculate number of months of difference #Pay attention to the date format.
# This script consider that you are using dd/mm/yyyy format. #If not, just configure the range between '[]' to your case.
# Getting inicial month and year and then converting to integer
startMonth = int((str(startDate))[3:5])
startYear = int((str(startDate))[6:10])

# Getting final month and year and then converting to integer

endMonth = int((str(endDate))[3:5])
endYear = int((str(endDate))[6:10])

# Be sure that the end date is bigger than start date.
if (startDate > endDate):
    Document.Properties["Result"]="This range is not valid. Please, try again."
else:
    # Apply this formula to calculate difference in months
    numberOfMonths = (((endYear - startYear) * 12) - startMonth + 1) + endMonth

#Storing the number of months in a document property
Document.Properties["Result"]=str(numberOfMonths) #print numberOfMonths

differenceinmonthsbetweentwodates.dxp