Question

I got a bit of a problem here. My database stores unix timestamps as a string 2011-09-01 20:22:36 and I need it as a Unix Timestamp ########### so I can compare it using a > then symbol. But I also need to have it automatically set the timestamp on update (ON UPDATE CURRENT TIMESTAMP) as well as have a default of the timestamp which is not really that important cause I can do that in PHP if I need to.

How can I do this? timestamp is now a date/time combo string and not a integre so I cannot compare it?

My comparison string is

$sql = sprintf("SELECT nid, field_date_value, field_movie_location_value FROM content_type_mobile_event WHERE updated<'%s'", $vid);

Incase anyone is wondering.

Answer 1

Use the UNIX_TIMESTAMP() function to convert it inside your query. If you must compare it to a Unix timestamp from PHP, it is easiest to allow MySQL to handle the column’s conversion on its end.

$sql = sprintf("SELECT nid, othercols FROM content_type_mobile_event WHERE UNIX_TIMESTAMP(updated) < '%s'", $vid);