[RESOLVED] cant figure timestamp...

rpsep2

hello,
im trying to add the current date/time to a mysql table in the field 'date', when a user uploads something (so i can later order the uploads by date)

but i just cant figure it...

right now ive got:

<?
mysql_query("INSERT INTO uploads (username, title, description, filepath, date) 
VALUES ('$username', '$title', '$description', '$filepath', 'NOW()')")or die(mysql_error());
?>

previously i tried things like adding the current date/ time into a variable($date), and replacing the 'now()' from above with said variable, but it still didnt work

<?
date_default_timezone_set('Europe/London');
			$date = date("F j, Y, H:i:a");
?>

my field is set up as a DATETIME type, if that makes a difference?

any help appreciated 🙂

EDIT: jees just as i post i figure it! the date has to be input in the year-month-date order, changed my $date variable to suit.

Derokorian

Take NOW() out of singe quotes. Single quotes delimit a string, but NOW() is a mysql function not a string.

Also your attempt to put the date in manually is also wrong, because MySQL expects the datetime to be in YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS format.

rpsep2

Derokorian;11001571 wrote:
Take NOW() out of singe quotes. Single quotes delimit a string, but NOW() is a mysql function not a string.

Also your attempt to put the date in manually is also wrong, because MySQL expects the datetime to be in YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS format.

hey thanks for reply!

is there a benifit to using the NOW() function instead of setting a timezone etc?
in your opinion, which one would be best for e.g worldwide users?

Derokorian

I recommend you read http://www.experts-exchange.com/Web_Development/Web_Languages-Standards/PHP/A_201-Handling-date-and-time-in-PHP-and-MySQL.html

rpsep2

hmm interesting.. i think ill change a few things to use the iso-8601 timestamp throughout, thank you

bradgrafelman

Personally, I would use a TIMESTAMP column with a DEFAULT value of CURRENT_TIMESTAMP. Then, when I want to INSERT a row, I would simply leave out that timestamp column from the INSERT query altogether.