Comparing two date values in RobotFramework - datetime

Question

I'm trying to compare two date values using conditional statement. My plan is to validate DueDate against CompletionDate and determine if the value of CompletionDate is greater than DueDate which is not valid date value. Tried different resolution but didn't work for my desired result.
Test Date
${a} Convert Date 12/30/2023 result_format=%Y/%m/%d date_format=%m/%d/%Y
${b} Convert Date 12/16/2022 result_format=%Y/%m/%d date_format=%m/%d/%Y
IF ${a} > ${b}
Log To Console A:${a} is greater than B:${b}
ELSE
Log To Console B:${b} is greater than A:${a}
END
The result is ${b}
My conclusion here is that the IF condition here is treating the date values differently
Is there any way to do this, I have browse already in the RobotFramework documentation but nothing fits to my problem. Thank you!

Answer 1

I think RF tries to do arithmetic on your dates. You can test this by trying date `1/1/2022'. There are two workarounds:
Put quotes around variables: IF '${a}' > '${b}'
Convert dates to epoch: result_format=epoch
Here is a code sample:
*** Settings ***
Library DateTime
*** Variables ***
${a_date} 12/30/2023
${b_date} 12/16/2022
*** Test Cases ***
Test Date with Epoch
${a_epoch} Convert Date ${a_date} result_format=epoch date_format=%m/%d/%Y
${b_epoch} Convert Date ${b_date} result_format=epoch date_format=%m/%d/%Y
IF ${a_epoch} > ${b_epoch}
Log To Console \nA:${a_epoch} is greater than B:${b_epoch}
ELSE
Log To Console \nB:${b_epoch} is greater than A:${b_epoch}
Fail A should be greater than B
END
Test Date with String
${a_str} Convert Date ${a_date} result_format=%Y/%m/%d date_format=%m/%d/%Y
${b_str} Convert Date ${b_date} result_format=%Y/%m/%d date_format=%m/%d/%Y
IF '${a_str}' > '${b_str}'
Log To Console \nA:${a_str} is greater than B:${b_str}
ELSE
Log To Console \nB:${b_str} is greater than A:${b_str}
Fail A should be greater than B
END