Question

I have a MySQL database, with a column that is date type DATETIME.

I am getting a string value for a date / time from an external application. That string value looks like this:

'5/15/2012 8:06:26 AM'

MySQL throws an error on the INSERT: "Error. Incorrect datetime value". My workaround was to change the column type to VARCHAR, which works, but I really need the data as a proper Date & Time for future use.

I researched accepted formatting for MySQL DATETIME values, and found that MySQL wants the DATETIME format as 'YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS'.

I can’t change the external application to reformat the date / time string in a format, so my only chance is to deal with it.

What I need to do, I think, is parse the existing string, using MySQL syntax, inside of my INSERT statement, but I’m not sure how to do that. I have some idea that I need to use a SELECT clause, perhaps STR_TO_DATE, somehow in combination with my INSERT statement.

Here is my current INSERT statement. I removed the other fields that are not causing a problem, just to make the example clean.

INSERT INTO tblInquiry (fldInquiryReceivedDateTime) VALUES ('5/15/2012 8:06:26')

Answer 1

Use MySQL’s STR_TO_DATE() function to parse the string that you’re attempting to insert:

INSERT INTO tblInquiry (fldInquiryReceivedDateTime) VALUES
  (STR_TO_DATE('5/15/2012 8:06:26 AM', '%c/%e/%Y %r'))