Question

In one of my Mysql database table the dates are stored in the format 31-Jan-05.
I’m trying to convert this format to 2005-01-31 before inserting them in other tables.
I’ve tried in this way str_to_date(exam_date, '%d%M%Y'), but i encounter the following error

Incorrect datetime value: '31-Jan-05' for function str_to_time

Can’t i change the date format from 31-Jan-05 to 2005-01-31 using str_to_date?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Yes. But you have two problems.

1. The second parameter is the current date format. (i.e. of the string)
2. You need to have the proper format (i.e. %b instead of %M).

Read the docs the for str_to_date().

str_to_date(exam_date, '%d-%b-%y')

Note: If you don’t have a zero padded day, then you need to use %e instead of %d.