How to handle Multiple date formats for the same date field in SQL*Loader

Question

Dear All,
I got a requirement where I need to get data from a text file and insert the same into oracle table.
I am using SQL*Loader to populate the data from the text file into my table.
The file has one field where I am expecting date date data in multiple formats, like dd/mon/yyyy, yyyy/dd/mon, yyyy/mon/dd, ,mm/dd/yyyy, mon/dd/yyyy.
While using SQL*Loader, I can see Loading is failing for records where we have formats like yyyy/dd/mon, yyyy/mon/dd, mon/dd/yyyy.
Is there any way in SQL*Loader where we can mention all these date formats so that this date data should go smoothly into the underlying date column in the table.
Appreciate your response on this.
Thanks,
Madhu K.

Answer 1

The point being made was, are you sure that you can uniquely identify a date format from the value you receieve? Are you sure that the data stored is only of a particular limited set of formats?
e.g. if you had a value of '07/08/03' how do you know what format that is?
It could be...
7th August 2003 (thus assuming it's DD/MM/RR format)
or
8th July 2003 (thus assuming it's MM/DD/RR format)
or
3rd August 2007 (thus assuming it's RR/MM/DD format)
or
8th March 2007 (thus assuming it's RR/DD/MM format)
or even more obscurely...
3rd July 2008 (MM/RR/DD)
or
7th March 2008 (DD/RR/MM)
Do you have any information to tell you what formats are valid that would allow you to be specific and know what date format is meant?
This is a classic example of why dates should be stored on the database using DATE datatype and not VARCHAR2. It can lead to corruption of data, especially if the date can be entered in any format a user wishes.