date format

Riaan Backer

Hi Xano Team

I have a date value 20211205(YYYYmmdd) which is a text value which I need to convert to a date format. I used the format_timestamp but the function does not know that the text value is in format (YYYYmmdd) and therefore returns a completely wrong date (1970-01-01T07:36:51+02:00)

The only way I can get this working is to substring the YYYY, the mm and then dd into 3 different variables and once this is done to concat the values to get it into a format like YYYY-mm-dd which then returns the correct results. Can you please confirm if there is a quicker and more effective way of achieving this.

Junior Vidotti

Here show the options for convert text to date:

https://docs.xano.com/working-with-data/timestamp#what-are-my-options-for-inputting-a-timestamp-into-xano-through-the-api

Try to convert your text value 20211205 to ISO 8601 without time (2021-11-05) and the use "to_timestamp" filter.
[image.png]
 

Junior Vidotti

A more complete solution, taking any text_date in yyyymmdd and returning a date:
[image.png][image.png]

Riaan Backer

 - thanks for your assistance. My question relates to if there are not an quicker way to get the text field into ISO format. I did something very similar to your solution. I am processing over 5000 records at a time and this will add overhead to the solution hence my question.

Junior Vidotti

 did you already experienced performance issues? I don't know the inner workings of Xano, but I think it's pretty basic processing...

Riaan Backer

I am busy testing this but I just want to ensure my logic is implemented in the most efficient way