How can you search for dates (datetimes) that contain a default value i.e. ''. I guess it is not:
select * from table where dateofbirth=''
All the dates seem to have a default value of '1900-01-01'. However, there are people in my database who have a date of birth on or before this date (histroic people mainly). Therefore I cannot do:
select * from table where dateofbirth='1900-01-01'
I know that some versions of SQL Server have a default date of: 1899-12-31.
I guess it is better to use nulls for unknown dates. I cannot do that in this case.
I have read through lots of questions on here about finding dates using SQL but I have not found an answer to my specific question.
You can get the default DateTime value as;
SELECT CONVERT(DATETIME, 0)
And apply it to the filter as appropriate;
SELECT * FROM [Table] WHERE DateOfBirth = CONVERT(DATETIME, 0)
Or if you need to select earlier dates then;
SELECT * FROM [Table] WHERE DateOfBirth <= CONVERT(DATETIME, 0)
Fiddle example
The best you are going to get is what you listed:
select * from table where dateofbirth='1900-01-01'
As you know, the problem is that if someone was really born on 1/1/1900, you will also include them. But there's really no way for your query to know the difference.
To fix this, you would need to change what your system is using for the default value (e.g. NULL or change to datetime2 or date datatype and use 1/1/0001). Then update all your 1/1/1900 values to the new default value. Yes, this will erroneously update any existing people with 1/1/1900 birthdays, but at least it will prevent any future occurrences.
In SQL Server terms a default value for column X is only used when a new record is first created and a value is not provided for that column. After the initial creation of the record the value is just a value, same as any other. Within a single table there is no way to distinguish between records that that hold the default value in column X because it was supplied, or because it was defaulted.
This won't help you now, but an alternative to nulls that is sometimes used is to use a 'magic value'. In the case of dates of births, the maximum datetime value of 31st December 9999 could be used to indicate an unknown value (assuming your system isn't expected to be in use in 8,000 years time :) Some people (including me) don't really approve of the use of magic values because there's no way in the database of indicating their magic status.
Rhys
Related
My question is how to properly write a SQL query for the below highlighted/bold question.
There is a table in HMO database which stores doctor's working
hours.Table has following fields
"FirstName","LastName","Date","HoursWorked". write a sql statement
which retrieves average working hours for period January-March for a
doctor with name Joe Doe.
so far i have
SELECT HoursWorked
FROM Table
WHERE DATE = (January - March) AND
SELECT AVG(HoursWorked) FROM Table WHERE FirstName="Joe",LastName="Doe"*
A few pointers as this sounds like a homework question (which we don't answer for you here, but we can try to give you some guidance).
You want to put all the things you want to return from your select first and you want to have all your search conditions at the end.
So the general format would be :
SELECT Column1,
Column2,
Column3,
FROM YourTable
WHERE Column4 = Restriction1
AND Column5 = Restriction2
The next thing you need to think about is how the dates are formatted in your database table. Hopefully they're kept in a column of type datetime or date (options will depend on the database engine you're using, eg, Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle or MySql). In reality some older databases people use can store dates in all sorts of formats which makes this much harder, but since I'm assuming it's a homework type question, lets assume it's a datetime format.
You specify restrictions by comparing columns to a value, so if you wanted all rows where the date was after midnight on the 2nd of March 2012, you would have the WHERE clause :
WHERE MyDateColumn >= '2012-03-02 00:00:00'
Note that to avoid confusion, we usually try to format dates as "Year-Month-Day Hour:Minute:Second". This is because in different countries, dates are often written in different formats and this is considered a Universal format which is understood (by computers at least) everywhere.
So you would want to combine a couple of these comparisons in your WHERE, one for dates AFTER a certain date in time AND one for dates before another point in time.
If you give this a go and see where you get to, update your question with your progress and someone will be able to help get it finished if you have problems.
If you don't have access to an actual database and need to experiment with syntax, try this site : http://sqlfiddle.com/
you already have the answer written
SELECT AVG(HoursWorked) FROM Table WHERE FirstName="Joe",LastName="Doe"*
you only need to fix the query
SELECT AVG(HoursWorked) as AVGWORKED FROM Table WHERE FirstName='Joe' AND LastName='Doe'
That query will give you the average hours worked for Joe Doe, however you only need to get between some time you add the next "AND", if you are using SQL server you can use the built in function DateFromParts(year,month,day) to create a new Date, or if you are using another Database Engine you can convert a string to a DateColumn Convert(Date,'MM/dd/yyyy')
Example
SELECT AVG(HoursWorked) as AVGWORKED FROM Table WHERE FirstName='Joe' AND LastName='Doe' AND DateColumn between DateFromParts(year,month,day) and Convert(Date,'MM/dd/yyyy')
In the example i showed both approaches (datefromparts for the initial date, and convert(date) for the ending date).
I am proposing to have a table (the design isn't settled on yet and can be altered dependent upon the views expressed in reply to this question) that will have a primary key of type int (using auto increment) and a field (ReturnPeriod of type Nchar) that will contain data in the form of '06 2013' (representing in this instance June 2013).
I would simply like to return 06 or whatever happens to be in the last record entered in the table. This table will never grow by more than 4 records per annum (so it will never be that big). It also has a column indicating the date that the last entry was created.
That column seems to my mind at least to be the most suitable candidate for getting the last record, so essentially I'd like to know if sql has a inbuilt function for comparing the date the query is run to the nearest match in a column, and to return the first two characters of a field.
So far I have:
Select Mid(ReturnPeriod,1,2) from Returns
Where DateReturnEntered = <and this is where I'm stuck>
What I'm looking for is a where clause that would get me the last entered record using the date the query is run as its reference point(DateRetunEntered of type Date contains the date a record was entered).
Of course there may be an even easier way to guarantee that one has the last record in which case I'm open to suggestions.
Thanks
I think you should store ReturnPeriod as a datetime for example not 06 2013 as a VARCHAR but 01.06.2013 as a DATETIME (first day of 06.2013).
In this case, if I've got your question right, you can use GETDATE() to get current time:
SELECT TOP 1 MONTH(ReturnPeriod)
FROM Returns
WHERE DateReturnEntered<=GETDATE()
ORDER BY DateReturnEntered DESC
If you store ReturnPeriod as a varchar then
SELECT TOP 1 LEFT(ReturnPeriod,2)
FROM Returns
WHERE DateReturnEntered<=GETDATE()
ORDER BY DateReturnEntered DESC
I would store your ReturnPeriod as a date datatype, using a nominal 1st of the month, e.g. 1 Jun 2013, if you don't have the actual date.
This will allow direct comparison against your entered date, with trivial formatting of the return value if required.
Your query would then find the latest date prior to your date entered.
SELECT MONTH(MAX(ReturnPeriod)) AS ReturnMonth
FROM Returns
WHERE ReturnPeriod <= #DateReturnEntered
I have this simple data base:
7/2/2013
7/13/2013
I write a simple SQL statement to select the greatest date from a list of date. I try to use the (max function) as follow:
select max([P_Date]) from [BalDB].[dbo].[tab_Product]
The result was incorrect; it gives me the smallest date not the greatest as follow:
7/2/2013
So please help me to know what is the problem in my SQL statement and how can I solve it
Problem: Get the greatest date from a list of date or compare it with local date and take the greater!!
The sql max function returns the largest value of the selected column, in your case since your data type is a nvarchar the largest value is what is alphabetically larger, which in this case is 7/2/2013 (since the "2" is greater then the "1" in "13").
What you need to do is basically what #David mentioned, either chance the data type of the column or if it isn't feasible then you can cast it in your query as a datetime
For example
select max(cast([P_Date] as datetime)) from [BalDB].[dbo].[tab_Product]
The max function is making this slower than it needs to be, try this.
select top 1 convert(datetime,P_Date) from [BalDB].[dbo].[tab_Product] order by convert(datetime,P_Date) desc
Now your dates should be date types, not varchars, but for the sake of querying your data as is, this will work.
I am trying to add months to an existing date in SQL. The new column displayed will have a followup column instead of a days column. Im getting an error in the select statement.can u help?
Create table auctions(
item varchar2(50),
datebought date,
datesold date,
days number
);
Insert into auctions values (‘Radio’,’12-MAY-2001’,’21-MAY-2001’,9);
Select item,datebought,datesold,ADD MONTHS(datesold,3)”followup” from auctions;
Your usage of the add_months() function is incorrect. It's not two words, it's just one (with an underscore)
add_months(datesold, 1)
note the underscore _ between ADD and MONTHS. It's function call not an operator.
Alternatively you could use:
datesold + INTERVAL '1' month
Although it's worth noting that the arithmetics with intervals is limited (if not broken) because it simply "increments" the month value of the date value. That can lead to invalid dates (e.g. from January to February). Although this is documented behaviour (see below links) I consider this a bug (the SQL standard requires those operations to "Arithmetic obey the natural rules associated with dates and times and yield valid datetime or interval results according to the Gregorian calendar")
See the manual for details:
http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E11882_01/server.112/e26088/functions011.htm#i76717
http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E11882_01/server.112/e26088/sql_elements001.htm#i48042
Another thing:
I am trying to add months to an existing date in SQL.
Then why are you using an INSERT statement? To change the data of existing rows you should use UPDATE. So it seems what you are really after is something like this:
update auctions
set datesold = add_months(datesold, 1)
where item = 'Radio';
Your SQL has typographical quotation marks, not standard ones. E.g. ’ is not the same as '. Instead of delimiting a string value, those quotes become part of the value, at least for the particular SQL I have here to test with.
If this doesn't fix your problem, try posting the error you're getting in your question. Magical debugging isn't possible.
This can be used to add months to a date in SQL:
select DATEADD(mm,1,getdate())
This might be a useful link.
I've been given a stack of data where a particular value has been collected sometimes as a date (YYYY-MM-DD) and sometimes as just a year.
Depending on how you look at it, this is either a variance in type or margin of error.
This is a subprime situation, but I can't afford to recover or discard any data.
What's the optimal (eg. least worst :) ) SQL table design that will accept either form while avoiding monstrous queries and allowing maximum use of database features like constraints and keys*?
*i.e. Entity-Attribute-Value is out.
You could store the year, month and day components in separate columns. That way, you only need to populate the columns for which you have data.
if it comes in as just a year make it default to 01 for month and date, YYYY-01-01
This way you can still use a date/datetime datatype and don't have to worry about invalid dates
Either bring it in as a string unmolested, and modify it so it's consistent in another step, or modify the year-only values during the import like SQLMenace recommends.
I'd store the value in a DATETIME type and another value (just an integer will do, or some kind of enumerated type) that signifies its precision.
It would be easier to give more information if you mentioned what kind of queries you will be doing on the data.
Either fix it, then store it (OK, not an option)
Or store it broken with a fixed computed columns
Something like this
CREATE TABLE ...
...
Broken varchar(20),
Fixed AS CAST(CASE WHEN Broken LIKE '[12][0-9][0-9][0-9]' THEN Broken + '0101' ELSE Broken END AS datetime)
This also allows you to detect good from bad source data
If you don't always have a full date, what sort of keys and constraints would you need? Perhaps store two columns of data; a full date, and a year. For data that has only year, the year is stored and date is null. For items with full info, both are populated.
I'd put three columns in the table:
The provided value (YYYY-MM-DD or YYYY)
A date column, Date or DateTime data type, which is nullable
A year column, as an integer or char(4) depending upon your needs.
I'd always populate the year column, populate the date column only when the provided value is a date.
And, because you've kept the provided value, you can always re-process down the road if needs change.
An alternative solution would be to that of a date mask (like in IP). Store the date in a regular datetime field, and insert an additional field of type smallint or something, where you could indicate which is present (could go even binary here):
If you have YYYY-MM-DD, you would have 3 bits of data, which will have the values 1 if data is present and 0 if not.
Example:
Date Mask
2009-12-05 7 (111)
2009-12-01 6 (110, only year and month are know, and day is set to default 1)
2009-01-20 5 (101, for some strange reason, only the year and the date is known. January has 31 days, so it will never generate an error)
Which solution is better depends on what you will do with it.
This is better when you want to select those with full dates, which are between a certain period (less to write). Also this way it's easier to compare any dates which have masks like 7,6,4. It may also take up less memory (date + smallint may be smaller than int+int+int, and only if datetime uses 64 bit, and smallint uses up as much as int, it will be the same).
I was going to suggest the same solution as #ninesided did above. Additionally, you could have a date field and a field that quantitatively represents your uncertainty. This offers the advantage of being able to represent things like "on or about Sept 23, 2010". The problem is that to represent the case where you only know the year, you'd have to set your date to be the middle of the year, with 182.5 days' uncertainty (assuming non-leap year), which seems ugly.
You could use a similar but distinct approach with a mask that represents what date parts you're confident about - that's what SQLMenace offered in his answer above.
+1 each to recommendations from ninesided, Nikki9696 and Jeff Siver - I support all those answers though none was exactly what I decided upon.
My solution:
a date column used only for complete dates
an int column used for years
a constraint to ensure integrity between the two
a trigger to populate the year if only date is supplied
Advantages:
can run simple (one-column) queries on the date column with missing data ignored (by using NULL for what it was designed for)
can run simple (one-column) queries on the year column for any row with a date (because year is automatically populated)
insert either year or date or both (provided they agree)
no fear of disagreement between columns
self explanatory, intuitive
I would argue that methods using YYYY-01-01 to signify missing data (when flagged as such with a second explanatory column) fail seriously on points 1 and 5.
Example code for Sqlite 3:
create table events
(
rowid integer primary key,
event_year integer,
event_date date,
check (event_year = cast(strftime("%Y", event_date) as integer))
);
create trigger year_trigger after insert on events
begin
update events set event_year = cast(strftime("%Y", event_date) as integer)
where rowid = new.rowid and event_date is not null;
end;
-- various methods to insert
insert into events (event_year, event_date) values (2008, "2008-02-23");
insert into events (event_year) values (2009);
insert into events (event_date) values ("2010-01-19");
-- select events in January without expressions on supplementary columns
select rowid, event_date from events where strftime("%m", event_date) = "01";