Question

Subracting dates with different formats

Asked by: MPJD

I want to calculate number of days by subtracting 2 dates in different date formats. 1st date comes from the user input while second date comes from the database

For ex. if I write following query -
select to_date('6/24/2007','MM/DD/YYYY') - to_date('13-JUN-07', 'dd-mon-yyyy') from dual;
it gives me wrong answer that is - 730498

can anybody please help? Thanks.


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Asked On
2007-07-20 at 11:37:41ID22710401
Topics

Oracle 10.x

,

Oracle Database

Participating Experts
3
Points
500
Comments
4

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Answers

 

by: angelIIIPosted on 2007-07-20 at 11:49:14ID: 19533944

the result is correct, because you said dd-mon-yyyy and you have only 07 as year.

this will give the result you expect:
select to_date('6/24/2007','MM/DD/YYYY') - to_date('13-JUN-07', 'dd-mon-yy') from dual;

 

by: markgeerPosted on 2007-07-20 at 12:00:06ID: 19534054

Oracle can easily do date arithmetic (subtracting one date value from another) and will give you the result in days by default.  If one of the values is already a "date" datatype (like from a "date" column in a table) no conversion is necessary for that value.  If either or both values though are character strings, you need to use "to_date" with an appropriate format mask to convert the value(s) to date(s) first.   If the character strings have a consistent format, this is quite easy.  If the character strings have a variety of formats though, then the task becomes difficult or impossible to automate.

 

by: sujit_kumarPosted on 2007-07-20 at 12:34:54ID: 19534374

I think you have a formatting error in your query. See below,

SELECT TO_DATE('6/24/2007','MM/DD/YYYY') - TO_DATE('13-JUN-07', 'dd-mon-yyyy') FROM DUAL;

OUTPUT
------
730498

SELECT TO_DATE('6/24/2007','MM/DD/YYYY') - TO_DATE('13-JUN-07', 'dd-mon-yy') FROM DUAL;

OUTPUT
------
11

 

by: MPJDPosted on 2007-07-20 at 12:43:49ID: 19534469

I apolozise for such a silly question. It was my mistake I overlooked that I am typing yyyy instead of yy. Thanks!!

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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