Difference between date datatype

Question

hi all,
We have oracle 10G R2 on windows.
we have table called set_1 as
SQL> desc set_1;
Name                                      Null?    Type
SL_NO                                              NUMBER
STARTTIME                                          DATE
ENDTIME                                            DATEin the table we have data like
SQL> ed
Wrote file afiedt.buf
  1  select sl_no,to_char(starttime,'dd-mm-yyyy hh24:mi:ss')starttime,
  2  to_char(endtime,'dd-mm-yyyy hh24:mi:ss')endtime
  3* from set_1 where rownum<=5
SQL> /
     SL_NO STARTTIME           ENDTIME
         4 11-12-2012 13:15:00 11-12-2012 13:15:36
        12 11-12-2012 15:15:00 11-12-2012 15:15:01
        20 11-12-2012 17:15:00 11-12-2012 17:15:12
        29 11-12-2012 19:30:00 11-12-2012 19:30:01
        41 11-12-2012 22:30:00 11-12-2012 22:30:01I want to retrive the data which will have fourth column difference between starttime and endtime in minuts and seconds only.
for that i wrote query but showing error...
select TO_CHAR(STARTTIME,'DD-MM-YYYY HH24:MI:SS') STARTTIME,TO_CHAR(ENDTIME,'DD-MM-YYYY HH24:MI:SS') ENDTTIME,
TO_CHAR(STARTTIME,'MM:SS')-TO_CHAR(ENDTIME,'MM:SS') DIFFERENCE FROM SET_1;
Error
TO_CHAR(STARTTIME,'MM:SS')-TO_CHAR(ENDTIME,'MM:SS') DIFFERENCE FROM SET_1
ERROR at line 2:
ORA-01722: invalid numberCan anybody help me to achive this...

Answer 1

>
I want to retrive the data which will have fourth column difference between starttime and endtime in minuts and seconds only.
>
Always start with something simple.
You can use the NUMTODSINTERVAL function to convert a number (e.g. the difference in seconds between two date values) to days, hours, minutes and seconds.
See the SQL Language doc
http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E11882_01/server.112/e17118/functions117.htm
WITH DATA AS (
  SELECT TO_DATE('11-12-2012 13:15:00','dd-mm-yyyy hh24:mi:ss')STARTTIME,
  TO_DATE('11-12-2012 13:15:36','dd-mm-yyyy hh24:mi:ss') ENDTIME
  FROM DUAL
  UNION ALL
  SELECT TO_DATE('11-12-2012 13:15:00','dd-mm-yyyy hh24:mi:ss')STARTTIME,
  TO_DATE('29-12-2012 09:29:31','dd-mm-yyyy hh24:mi:ss') ENDTIME
  FROM DUAL
SELECT DATA.*, numtodsinterval((endtime - starttime) * 86400, 'SECOND') myDIFF
from data;
STARTTIME,ENDTIME,MYDIFF
12/11/2012 1:15:00 PM,12/11/2012 1:15:36 PM,+00 00:00:36.000000
12/11/2012 1:15:00 PM,12/29/2012 9:29:31 AM,+17 20:14:31.000000If that is not what you want then you will need to write a function to compute the exact form that you want.
Here is a Java sample that converts a time in milliseconds to HH:MI:SS.nnnn format. You would use a similar PL/SQL function.
*  elapsed time in hours/minutes/seconds/milliseconds
* @return String
public static String getHoursMinutesSecondsFromMilliTime(long milliTime) {
    int milliSecondsPerSecond = 1000;
    int milliSecondsPerMinute = 60 * milliSecondsPerSecond;
    int milliSecondsPerHour   = 60 * milliSecondsPerMinute;
    long hours;
    long minutes;
    long seconds;
    long milliSeconds;
    long modRemainder;
    String result;
    hours = milliTime / milliSecondsPerHour;
    modRemainder = milliTime - (hours * milliSecondsPerHour);
    minutes = modRemainder / milliSecondsPerMinute;
    modRemainder = modRemainder - (minutes * milliSecondsPerMinute);
    seconds = modRemainder / milliSecondsPerSecond;
    milliSeconds = modRemainder - (seconds * milliSecondsPerSecond);
    result = hours + ":" + minutes + ":" + seconds + ":" + milliSeconds;
    return result;
}