Doing cell->getValue() on loop stops when the value is a DateTime Object

[Zeit42]

I have an excel file I'm trying to loop through. So far, I'm able to navigate to the worksheet I have to work on. I'm currently trying to loop through the data rows I have, and so far, this works for me:

    foreach ($sheet->getRowIterator() as $row) {
        $cells = $row->getCells();
        foreach ($cells as $cell){
            $cell_value = $cell->getValue();
            echo "Cell Value = $cell_value<br>\n";
        }
    }

For the most part, this works a treat because most of the values are strings or numbers.

However, I've noticed that it doesn't work for date.

For example, I used print_r on the $cells variable just to double check and here's what I got:

    [4] => Box\Spout\Common\Entity\Cell Object
        (
            [value:protected] => DateTime Object
                (
                    [date] => 1963-05-13 00:00:00.000000
                    [timezone_type] => 3
                    [timezone] => UTC
                )
         }

The value is being read properly but as opposed to the other data rows I have, the value is a datetime object and not a string, and this presents an error.

I saw the setShouldFormatDate property in the documentation. While I'm able to use this with getValue() to get the formatted value in Excel (usually a dd-MMM-yy format like 11 APR 22), I'd like to be able to get this in the yyyy-mm-dd format.

Is there a way to do this within the library? Or do I just get the formatted value and then use PHP's built in function to convert the formatted date to my desired format?

Thank you.