Question

I have a ‘timestamp’ type column in my table called updated_date. When adding a column to the table, all rows got updated to the same updated_date. Not a disaster as we’re still in testing, but it kind of broke the functionality of our site (which shows things in order of updated_date).

Is there a way I can change all the updated_date values in the column (but where id is lower than x) to some random date (or an incremental date)?

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

This might solve your problem:

UPDATE updated_table SET timestamp = FROM_UNIXTIME(1e9 + id) WHERE id < x;

Basically it sets dates to Unix timestamps corresponding to 1 billion + id (1,000,000,000 unix timestamp is 2001-09-08 21:46:40). That way you get unique timestamps in order of id.