does mysql have auto date

[buckeyejack]

Hello
I was wondering is there any way to record the date something was entered into the database with out doing it manually?

like maybe a hidden field in the form or something?
thanks🙂
matt

[Anon]

You could use a TIMESTAMP field in your tables... it gets set to NOW() whenever the record is modified. It's only good as a date_created field if you are sure you won't be updating the record.

Of course that's just as much effort as having a DATETIME field and entering NOW() on an insert.

[Anon]

What I do is at the end of EVERY table I create, I add two timestamp fields. The first is called modified_timestamp and the second is called create_timestamp.

That way whenever I update a row, the modified_timestamp gets updated to show me when the record was last changed and the create_timestamp always stays unchanged to indicate when the record was created.

It seems that this information always comes in handy at one point or another. It eats up a total of 8 bytes on every row, but I think it is well worth it.

[[deleted]]

Neat trick used here: MySQL will only update the first timestamp field it finds in a row. Any other timestamps are left alone.

Unfortunately, this also means that during an INSERT, only the FIRST timestamp is filled, the rest remains "0000000".
So you still have to manually feed it the create_date, or INSERT a NULL into the create_date.

[buckeyejack]

Sounds like a great Idea thanks 🙂