Tech notes

Mon, 07 Jan 2008, 12:12pm

One of the most common issues encountered when performing data conversion is the problem of converting text to dates.

When dates are entered/stored as text strings, there are almost as many variations in the date formats as there are data entry users! Locale also plays a huge role in the wide variety of date formats. The task of converting text to a "true" date field in any application or database can be difficult and often requires "writing code" to translate the text strings to dates.

Pervasive DataTools Data Loaders are the solution for text to date conversion!

Each Data Loader includes two built-in features for handling text to date conversions, as follows:

• For text and spreadsheet data sources, each Data Loader can auto-detect data fields that contain consistently-formatted date strings. The transformation engine will auto-convert these date strings to the correct date format for your target application or database.
• In cases where the source date strings are not consistent, use the graphical expression builder that includes over 20 built-in date, time, and date/time functions to convert date strings to the correct date format for your target application or database.

Free trial licenses are available for the Data Loaders. Simply register on the Pervasive DataTools web site, order a trial license and test with your database, application, or data file on your system to determine if the DataTools products work for your data project!

- The Pervasive DataTools Team