Hi,
The uploaded file
MySQL-DateFormat-1.00.tar.gz
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>From the doco:
NAME
MySQL::DateFormat -- Manipulate dates back and forth
between human-readable and MySQL formats
SYNOPSIS
use MySQL::DateFormat;
my $md = MySQL::DateFormat->new(format => 'us');
print $md->toMySQL("5/31/87"); # prints "1987-05-31"
print $md->frMySQL("1987-05-31"); # prints "05-31-1987"
DESCRIPTION
The MySQL RDBMS requires dates to be supplied in
YYYY-MM-DD format[1,2,3], but many humans expect dates to
be presented, and to be able to enter them, in MM-DD-YY or
DD-MM-YY format or similar. This module converts dates
back and forth between human-readable and MySQL format.
While there are multiple ways in Perl to format dates, and
while certain modules on CPAN exist that perform the date
formatting that is part of this module's functionality,
the author believes that there is a place for a package
tailored to the MySQL database. Even if one used
Date::Format and the super-configurability of its
underlying C routines, there would still be a need in a
large application for a package containing routines to
reformat the dates coming in and going out of the database
server. And that's not all:
The module allows the user to configure the format for
dates used in the application code, whether to use or req
uire four digits for the year, what year to use as century
cutoff if two-digit years are allowed, etc., etc. All
these configuration options are managed by the user
through an extrememly simple interface. In the realm in
which this module is intended to be used, the author has
found this to be a significant advantage.
Another very important task when using MySQL is error
checking of the "human-readable" dates supplied. This is
because MySQL does not raise an error when given an
invalid date, but simply inserts "0000-00-00". The module
handles error-checking transparently.
-------------------------------------
[1] This format is accepted in many, but not apparently
all, circles as ISO format.
[2] MySQL also accepts strings as dates, but that behavior
is not dealt with here.
[3] To quote from the MySQL docs: "Although MySQL tries to
interpret values in several formats, it always expects the
year part of date values to be leftmost. Dates must be
given in year-month-day order (for example, '98-09-04'),
rather than in the month-day-year or day-month-year orders
commonly used elsewhere (for example, '09-04-98',
'04-09-98')."
[ ... ]
Enjoy,
Nick
~~~~~~~~~~~
Nick Tonkin
