oracle to_timestamp and to_date

Oracle/PLSQL: To_Timestamp Function

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In Oracle/PLSQL, the to_timestamp function converts a string to a timestamp.

The syntax for the to_timestamp function is:

to_timestamp( string1, [ format_mask ] [ 'nlsparam' ] )

string1 is the string that will be converted to a timestamp.

format_mask is optional. This is the format that will be used to convert string1 to a timestamp.

The following is a list of options for the format_mask parameter. These parameters can be used in many combinations.

Parameter	Explanation
YYYY	4-digit year
MM	Month (01-12; JAN = 01).
MON	Abbreviated name of month.
MONTH	Name of month, padded with blanks to length of 9 characters.
DD	Day of month (1-31).
HH	Hour of day (1-12).
HH12	Hour of day (1-12).
HH24	Hour of day (0-23).
MI	Minute (0-59).
SS	Second (0-59).

Applies To:

• Oracle 9i, Oracle 10g, Oracle 11g

For example:

to_timestamp('2003/12/13 10:13:18', 'YYYY/MM/DD HH:MI:SS')

would return '13-DEC-03 10.13.18.000000000 AM' as a timestamp value.

to_timestamp('2003/DEC/13 10:13:18', 'YYYY/MON/DD HH:MI:SS')

would also return '13-DEC-03 10.13.18.000000000 AM' as a timestamp value.