<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html> <head profile="http://internetalchemy.org/2003/02/profile"> <link rel="foaf" type="application/rdf+xml" title="FOAF" href="http://www.openlinksw.com/dataspace/uda/about.rdf" /> <link rel="schema.dc" href="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" /> <meta name="dc.title" content="Function: datestring, datestring_gmt, - Virtuoso Functions Guide" /> <meta name="dc.subject" content="Function: datestring, datestring_gmt, - Virtuoso Functions Guide" /> <meta name="dc.creator" content="OpenLink Software Documentation Team ; " /> <meta name="dc.copyright" content="OpenLink Software, 1999 - 2009" /> <link rel="top" href="index.html" title="OpenLink Virtuoso Universal Server: Documentation" /> <link rel="search" href="/doc/adv_search.vspx" title="Search OpenLink Virtuoso Universal Server: Documentation" /> <link rel="parent" href="functions.html" title="Chapter Contents" /> <link rel="prev" href="appendixa.html" title="Appendix" /> <link rel="next" href="functions.html#.html" title="" /> <link rel="shortcut icon" href="../images/misc/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="doc.css" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/doc/translation.css" /> <title>Function: datestring, datestring_gmt, - Virtuoso Functions Guide</title> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/xhtml; charset=UTF-8" /> <meta name="author" content="OpenLink Software Documentation Team ; " /> <meta name="copyright" content="OpenLink Software, 1999 - 2009" /> <meta name="keywords" content="" /> <meta name="GENERATOR" content="OpenLink XSLT Team" /> </head> <body> <div id="header"> <a name="fn_datestring" /> <img src="../images/misc/logo.jpg" alt="" /> <h1>22. Virtuoso Functions Guide - datestring, datestring_gmt, </h1> </div> <div id="navbartop"> <div> <a class="link" href="functions.html">Chapter Contents</a> | <a class="link" href="fn_datediff.html" title="datediff">Prev</a> | <a class="link" href="fn_datestring_gmt.html" title="datestring_GMT">Next</a> </div> </div> <div id="currenttoc"> <form method="post" action="/doc/adv_search.vspx"> <div class="search">Keyword Search: <br /> <input type="text" name="q" /> <input type="submit" name="go" value="Go" /> </div> </form> <div> <a href="http://www.openlinksw.com/">www.openlinksw.com</a> </div> <div> <a href="http://docs.openlinksw.com/">docs.openlinksw.com</a> </div> <br /> <div> <a href="index.html">Book Home</a> </div> <br /> <div> <a href="contents.html">Contents</a> </div> <div> <a href="preface.html">Preface</a> </div> <br /> <div> <a class="selected" href="functions.html">Virtuoso Functions Guide</a> </div> <br /> <div> <a href="functions.html#admin">Administration</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#aggr">Aggregate Functions</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#array">Array Manipulation</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#bpel">BPEL APIs</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#backup">Backup</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#compression">Compression</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#cursors">Cursor</a> </div> <div> <a class="selected" href="functions.html#time">Date & Time Manipulation</a> </div> <div class="selected"> <div> <a class="selected" href="fn_datestring.html"> datestring, ...</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_curdate.html">curdate</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_dateadd.html">dateadd</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_datediff.html">datediff</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_datestring_gmt.html">datestring_gmt</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_dayname.html">dayname</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_dayofmonth.html">dayofmonth</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_dayofweek.html">dayofweek</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_dayofyear.html">dayofyear</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_dt_set_tz.html">dt_set_tz</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_get_timestamp.html">get_timestamp</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_getdate.html">getdate</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_hour.html">hour</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_minute.html">minute</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_month.html">month</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_monthname.html">monthname</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_msec_time.html">msec_time</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_now.html">now</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_quarter.html">quarter</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_second.html">second</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_stringdate.html">stringdate</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_stringtime.html">stringtime</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_timezone.html">timezone</a> </div> <div> <a href="fn_week.html">week</a> </div> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#debug">Debug</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#dict">Dictionary Manipulation</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#encoding">Encoding & Decoding</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#file">File Manipulation</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#ft">Free Text</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#hash">Hashing / Cryptographic</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#ldap">LDAP</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#localization">Locale</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#mail">Mail</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#misc">Miscellaneous</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#number">Number</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#phrz">Phrases</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#rdf">RDF data</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#rmt">Remote SQL Data Source</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#repl">Replication</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#soap">SOAP</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#sql">SQL</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#string">String</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#txn">Transaction</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#type">Type Mapping</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#uddi">UDDI</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#udt">User Defined Types & The CLR</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#vad">VAD</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#jvmpl">Virtuoso Java PL API</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#bif">Virtuoso Server Extension Interface (VSEI)</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#ws">Web & Internet</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#xml">XML</a> </div> <div> <a href="functions.html#XPATH">XPATH & XQUERY</a> </div> <br /> <div> <a href="functionidx.html">Functions Index</a> </div> <br /> </div> <div id="text"> <h2> datestring, datestring_gmt, </h2> <div class="refpurpose">convert a datetime from internal to external date-time representation</div> <div class="funcsynopsis"> <span class="funcdef"> <span class="function">datestring</span> </span> (<span class="paramdef">in <span class="parameter">date</span> datetime</span>); </div> <div class="funcsynopsis"> <span class="funcdef"> <span class="function">datestring_gmt</span> </span> (<span class="paramdef">in <span class="parameter">date</span> datetime</span>); </div> <div class="refsect1"> <div class="refsect1title">Description</div> <p> <span class="computeroutput">datestring</span> and datestring_gmt convert <span class="computeroutput">timestamps</span> or <span class="computeroutput">datetimes</span> from internal to external date-time representation. The external representation is a human-readable ASCII string of up to 30 characters. </p> <p>The external format is: <span class="computeroutput">YYYY-MM-DD hh:mm:ss uuuuuu</span> where <span class="computeroutput">uuuuuu</span> represents microseconds.</p> <div class="note"> <div class="notetitle">Note:</div> <p>Using <span class="computeroutput">cast (dt as varchar)</span> is preferred over <span class="computeroutput">datestring</span>.</p> </div> </div> <div class="refsect1"> <div class="refsect1title">Parameters</div> <div class="refsect2"> <span class="refsect2title">date – </span> A <span class="computeroutput">datetime</span> value. </div> </div> <div class="refsect1"> <div class="refsect1title">Return values</div> <p> <span class="computeroutput">datestring</span> and <span class="computeroutput">datestring_GMT</span> return a <span class="computeroutput">varchar</span>.</p> </div> <div class="refsect1"> <div class="refsect1title">Examples</div> <a name="ex_datestring_1" /> <div class="example"> <div class="exampletitle">Simple Example</div> <p>Get current date in human-readable form.</p> <div> <pre class="screen"> SQL> select datestring(now()); callret VARCHAR _______________________________________________________________________________ 2001-03-01 12:49:59.000000 1 Rows. -- 585 msec. </pre> </div> </div> <a name="ex_datestring_2" /> <div class="example"> <div class="exampletitle">A table query example</div> <p>Get orders shipped later than July 3, 1996</p> <div> <pre class="screen"> SQL> select left (datestring(ShippedDate), 10) from Orders where ShippedDate > stringdate ('1996.6.3'); callret VARCHAR _______________________________________________________________________________ 1996-06-04 1996-06-04 1996-06-05 1996-06-05 1996-06-05 5 Rows. -- 3 msec. </pre> </div> </div> </div> <div class="refsect1"> <div class="refsect1title">See Also</div> <p> <a href="fn_datestring_gmt.html">datestring_gmt</a>, <a href="fn_stringdate.html">stringdate</a> </p> <p> The discussion of <a href="coredbengine.html#DTTIMESTAMP"> <span class="computeroutput">TIMESTAMP</span> </a> datatype in section <a href="coredbengine.html">Database Concepts</a> of the documentation.</p> </div> </div> <div id="footer"> <div>Copyright© 1999 - 2009 OpenLink Software All rights reserved.</div> <div id="validation"> <a href="http://validator.w3.org/check/referer"> <img src="http://www.w3.org/Icons/valid-xhtml10" alt="Valid XHTML 1.0!" height="31" width="88" /> </a> <a href="http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/"> <img src="http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/images/vcss" alt="Valid CSS!" height="31" width="88" /> </a> </div> </div> </body> </html>