"Friday" with preference set to future yields a Tuesday in the past.

[yspreen]

Python 3.12.7 (main, Oct  1 2024, 02:05:46) [Clang 16.0.0 (clang-1600.0.26.3)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import dateparser
>>> from datetime import datetime, timedelta
>>>
>>> def date(s):
...     parsed_date = dateparser.parse(s, settings={"PREFER_DATES_FROM": "future"})
...     return parsed_date.strftime("%a %b %d")
...
>>>
>>> date("Friday")
'Tue Oct 08'
>>> datetime.now()
datetime.datetime(2024, 10, 31, 21, 37, 14, 810455)

I called this method earlier today, before UTC time (I'm -4) was past midnight and I got Oct 1 instead, also a Tuesday. Checking the year reveals that it's indeed Oct 2024 which is in the past.

dateparser==1.2.0

[yspreen]

in other news, when I parse "Nov 1" I now get "Sat Nov 1" which is also incorrect since Nov 1 is a friday this year.

[yspreen]

doesn't seem like the library is actively maintained, so for anyone running into this issue in the future, this worked for me:

def date(s):
    cal = parsedatetime.Calendar()
    time_struct, parse_status = cal.parse(s)
    date = datetime(*time_struct[:6])

    # Format in Eastern timezone if needed

    eastern_date = pytz.timezone("US/Eastern").localize(date)
    return eastern_date.strftime("%a %b %d")

[terkalma]

This seems to be caused by a small bug in the "absolute-time" parser:
here:

dateparser/dateparser/parser.py

Line 493 in 47acb88

if "future" in self.settings.PREFER_DATES_FROM:

the delta is correctly applied. Applying the delta can change the month, but that change is reset using the relative base right afterwards:

dateparser/dateparser/parser.py

Line 621 in 47acb88

dateobj = po._correct_for_month(dateobj)

see:

dateparser/dateparser/utils/__init__.py

Line 193 in 47acb88

return date_obj.replace(month=options[settings.PREFER_MONTH_OF_YEAR])

[jbergler]

I'm also seeing something that I think is related.

>>> dateparser.parse('now')
datetime.datetime(2025, 1, 1, 22, 13, 14, 778576)

>>> dateparser.parse('11:30pm friday')
datetime.datetime(2024, 1, 27, 23, 30)

^ actually a saturday

>>> dateparser.parse('11:30pm friday jan')
datetime.datetime(2025, 1, 1, 23, 30)

^ not a friday either