Question

I am using MS SQL Server 2008 R2 and I need to have a cell in each row with the date and time of when the row was inserted in the database. Now as I want to script and then load the database in MS SQL Server 2005 I Cannot use datetime or date so I tried to use getdate() function in the Computed Column Specification property. Can anyone please help me.

Thanks

Answer 1

Jean Claude, here is a complete example.

Code

USE tempdb;
SET NOCOUNT ON;
GO

CREATE TABLE dbo.TestTable (
    RecordId         int         IDENTITY,
    RecordValue      varchar(32) NOT NULL,
    RecordCreateDate datetime    NOT NULL,

    CONSTRAINT PK_TestTable
    PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED (
        RecordId
    )
)
GO

ALTER TABLE dbo.TestTable
ADD CONSTRAINT DF_TestTable_RecordCreateDate
DEFAULT GETDATE()
FOR RecordCreateDate;
GO

INSERT INTO dbo.TestTable (RecordValue) VALUES ('this');
WAITFOR DELAY '00:00:01';
INSERT INTO dbo.TestTable (RecordValue) VALUES ('that');
WAITFOR DELAY '00:00:01';
INSERT INTO dbo.TestTable (RecordValue) VALUES ('the other thing');

SELECT * FROM dbo.TestTable;

Results

RecordId RecordValue     RecordCreateDate
-------- --------------- -----------------------
1        this            2012-05-16 10:43:48.400
2        that            2012-05-16 10:43:49.403
3        the other thing 2012-05-16 10:43:50.403

You should also research the new datetime data types and the SYSDATETIME() function.