Adding current date and time records to MySQL table field

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Inserting present date and time to a field of mysql table

Adding ( or inserting ) date to a mysql date field is one of the common requirement. Some time we have to add current date and time while inserting the record. With this every time a record is added, the present date and time also added along with the record. Before adding date or date and time we have to format the data in a format acceptable to the mysql date field. MySQL date field will accept only valid dates and times so proper formatting is a must and we will discuss here how a record with a date field and a date and time filed is added to a mysql table. We have one date field and one date time field in our table so we will try to format for both the fields. Here are the formats.

For a date field it should be
YYYY-mm-dd
Example: 2005-12-26

For a date and time field it should be
YYYY-mm-dd H:i:s
Example: 2005-12-26 23:50:30

So with this here is one simple SQL query to add a record with a date and date & time field.

INSERT INTO dt_tb (dt,dt2) VALUES ('2004-05-05 23:56:25', '2005-06-12');

Adding present ( current ) date and time while inserting a record.
Now let us try to add default date and time to the table. That is when ever a record is to be added, it will insert present date and time to the table. So we will format the present date and then present date with time. Let us take two variables $dt1 ( storing the present date value ) and $dt2 ( storing the present date and time ).

$dt1=date(“Y-m-d”);
$dt2=date(“Y-m-d H:i:s”);

Now our sql query with these two date values will be like this

INSERT INTO dt_tb(dt,dt2) VALUES ('$dt2', '$dt1');

Here is the sql code to create and fill the table with records

CREATE TABLE dt_tb ( id int(2) NOT NULL auto_increment, dt datetime NOT NULL default '0000-00-00 00:00:00', dt2 date NOT NULL default '0000-00-00', PRIMARY KEY (id) ) TYPE=MyISAM;

Further Improvements
However this way we are adding date and time to a field through a sql query. First we are calculating the current date and time value by using PHP and then storing that value in a filed.

MySQL can automatically insert the current date and time value to a field once the record is added. Not only that it can store the last updated time of the record automatically with out using any specific sql query. We can learn the above two points on how automatically MySQL stores last record insertion / updating date and time in a DATETIME filed
.

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