158

I have a date column in a MySQL table. I want to insert a datetime.datetime() object into this column. What should I be using in the execute statement?

I have tried:

now = datetime.datetime(2009,5,5)

cursor.execute("INSERT INTO table
(name, id, datecolumn) VALUES (%s, %s
, %s)",("name", 4,now))

I am getting an error as: "TypeError: not all arguments converted during string formatting" What should I use instead of %s?

1
  • you missed quotes around %s cursor.execute("INSERT INTO table (name, id, datecolumn) VALUES (%s, %s , '%s')",("name", 4,now)) Commented Jun 20, 2018 at 19:56

9 Answers 9

248

For a time field, use:

import time    
time.strftime('%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S')

I think strftime also applies to datetime.

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7 Comments

Also, make sure your column name isn't a reserved word. Took me 30 minutes to realize the name "current_date" was causing problems...ugh!
What is time in this example?
J McMahon: time is a Python module.
What if someone wants to fetch the only Year, Month, Day?
@PoojaKhatri time.strftime('%Y-%m-%d')
|
52

You are most likely getting the TypeError because you need quotes around the datecolumn value.

Try:

now = datetime.datetime(2009, 5, 5)

cursor.execute("INSERT INTO table (name, id, datecolumn) VALUES (%s, %s, '%s')",
               ("name", 4, now))

With regards to the format, I had success with the above command (which includes the milliseconds) and with:

now.strftime('%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S')

Hope this helps.

2 Comments

You may not have quotes around %s in pymsql.
Quotes around the third %s cause error when I try this.
15

Try using now.date() to get a Date object rather than a DateTime.

If that doesn't work, then converting that to a string should work:

now = datetime.datetime(2009,5,5)
str_now = now.date().isoformat()
cursor.execute('INSERT INTO table (name, id, datecolumn) VALUES (%s,%s,%s)', ('name',4,str_now))

1 Comment

Don't you need to add quotes around the string parameters i.e. "... VALUES ('%s','%s','%s')"
15

Use Python method datetime.strftime(format), where format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'.

import datetime

now = datetime.datetime.utcnow()

cursor.execute("INSERT INTO table (name, id, datecolumn) VALUES (%s, %s, %s)",
               ("name", 4, now.strftime('%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S')))

Timezones

If timezones are a concern, the MySQL timezone can be set for UTC as follows:

cursor.execute("SET time_zone = '+00:00'")

And the timezone can be set in Python:

now = datetime.datetime.utcnow().replace(tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc)

MySQL Documentation

MySQL recognizes DATETIME and TIMESTAMP values in these formats:

As a string in either 'YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS' or 'YY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS' format. A “relaxed” syntax is permitted here, too: Any punctuation character may be used as the delimiter between date parts or time parts. For example, '2012-12-31 11:30:45', '2012^12^31 11+30+45', '2012/12/31 11*30*45', and '2012@12@31 11^30^45' are equivalent.

The only delimiter recognized between a date and time part and a fractional seconds part is the decimal point.

The date and time parts can be separated by T rather than a space. For example, '2012-12-31 11:30:45' '2012-12-31T11:30:45' are equivalent.

As a string with no delimiters in either 'YYYYMMDDHHMMSS' or 'YYMMDDHHMMSS' format, provided that the string makes sense as a date. For example, '20070523091528' and '070523091528' are interpreted as '2007-05-23 09:15:28', but '071122129015' is illegal (it has a nonsensical minute part) and becomes '0000-00-00 00:00:00'.

As a number in either YYYYMMDDHHMMSS or YYMMDDHHMMSS format, provided that the number makes sense as a date. For example, 19830905132800 and 830905132800 are interpreted as '1983-09-05 13:28:00'.

Comments

3

What database are you connecting to? I know Oracle can be picky about date formats and likes ISO 8601 format.

**Note: Oops, I just read you are on MySQL. Just format the date and try it as a separate direct SQL call to test.

In Python, you can get an ISO date like

now.isoformat()

For instance, Oracle likes dates like

insert into x values(99, '31-may-09');

Depending on your database, if it is Oracle you might need to TO_DATE it:

insert into x
values(99, to_date('2009/05/31:12:00:00AM', 'yyyy/mm/dd:hh:mi:ssam'));

The general usage of TO_DATE is:

TO_DATE(<string>, '<format>')

If using another database (I saw the cursor and thought Oracle; I could be wrong) then check their date format tools. For MySQL it is DATE_FORMAT() and SQL Server it is CONVERT.

Also using a tool like SQLAlchemy will remove differences like these and make your life easy.

1 Comment

I don't recommend using datetime.isoformat() because if you use a timezone aware object, the generated string includes timezone data and no longer matches the required mysql format.
1

If you're just using a python datetime.date (not a full datetime.datetime), just cast the date as a string. This is very simple and works for me (mysql, python 2.7, Ubuntu). The column published_date is a MySQL date field, the python variable publish_date is datetime.date.

# make the record for the passed link info
sql_stmt = "INSERT INTO snippet_links (" + \
    "link_headline, link_url, published_date, author, source, coco_id, link_id)" + \
    "VALUES(%s, %s, %s, %s, %s, %s, %s) ;"

sql_data = ( title, link, str(publish_date), \
             author, posted_by, \
             str(coco_id), str(link_id) )

try:
    dbc.execute(sql_stmt, sql_data )
except Exception, e:
    ...

Comments

0
    dt= datetime.now()

    query = """INSERT INTO table1(python_Date_col)
               VALUES (%s)
            """
    conn = ...... # Connection creating process
    cur = conn.cursor()
    cur.execute(query,(dt))

Above code will fail as "datetime.now()" produces "datetime.datetime(2014, 2, 11, 1, 16)" as a parameter value to insert statement.

Use the following method to capture the datetime which gives string value.

    dt= datetime.now().strftime("%Y%m%d%H%M%S")

I was able to successfully run the code after the change...

Comments

-1

when iserting into t-sql

this fails:

select CONVERT(datetime,'2019-09-13 09:04:35.823312',21)

this works:

select CONVERT(datetime,'2019-09-13 09:04:35.823',21)

easy way:

regexp = re.compile(r'\.(\d{6})')
def to_splunk_iso(dt):
    """Converts the datetime object to Splunk isoformat string."""
    # 6-digits string.
    microseconds = regexp.search(dt).group(1)
    return regexp.sub('.%d' % round(float(microseconds) / 1000), dt)

Comments

-1

for example date is 5/5/22 convert it into mysql date format 2022-05-05 to insert record in mysql database %m month %d date %Y Year of 4 digits %y 2 digits

Code Below:

from datetime import datetime
now='5/5/22'
print("Before", now)
now= datetime.strptime(dob,'%m/%d/%y').strftime('%Y-%m-%d')
print("After", now)
cursor.execute("INSERT INTO table (name, id, datecolumn) VALUES (%s, %s, %s)",(name, 4,now))

Output:

Before 5/5/22

After 2022-05-05
(mysql format you can easily insert into database) it will be inserted in mysql table

Comments

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