Formatting an XML string that has a date

Question

Hi All - new to this forum!
Not familiar with XML operations and seeking some advise. I have a field that contains XML text that has a date within that I want to extract and format appropriately for some reports.
Getting to the date portion of the field is not pretty (original code below) and could desire some work itself, but the real problem lies in formatting the date once extracted; sometimes the date text is in the format of "Month DD YYYY" and other times "DD Month YYYY" so the below code fails if the latter is found.
SELECT TO_DATE(RTRIM(SUBSTR(email_variables, INSTR(email_variables,'CHECKIN_DATE')+22,18),']]></CHECKIN_DATE><CHECKOUT_DATE>]'),'Month DD YYYY') CHECKIN_DATE,COUNT(*)
FROM t_ecomm_relations_queue
WHERE code_corr_ecat = 'PREA'
AND status IN ('A', 'R')
AND TO_DATE(RTRIM(SUBSTR(email_variables, INSTR(email_variables,'CHECKIN_DATE')+22,18),']]></CHECKIN_DATE><CHECKOUT_DATE>]'), 'Month DD YYYY') < TRUNC(SYSDATE) + 7
AND TO_DATE(RTRIM(SUBSTR(email_variables, INSTR(email_variables,'CHECKIN_DATE')+22,18),']]></CHECKIN_DATE><CHECKOUT_DATE>]'), 'Month DD YYYY') >= TRUNC(SYSDATE)
GROUP BY TO_DATE(RTRIM(SUBSTR(email_variables, INSTR(email_variables,'CHECKIN_DATE')+22,18),']]></CHECKIN_DATE><CHECKOUT_DATE>]'),'Month DD YYYY');
Any ideas for more efficient code or options for formatting is appreciated.
Thank you!

Answer 1

The best thing to do with a date you want to report on, is to not store it corrupted inside XML.
Multiple reasons why are discussed here.
If you are stuck with the ugly inefficient design, then you are probably stuck with ugly inefficient code as a result.