1/1/0001 12:00:00 AM not Updating SQL 2008 Date field

Question

this is just weird and is giving me a headache. I looked over my code and I don't see any logical errors causing it.

Any other date set to my birthDate DateTime variable in my class works when I add it as the value in my conn.AddParam, but when I send back 1/1/0001 12:00:00 AM (which was sent by setting it to MinValue) to SQL 2008's Date field, it remains the default which I have set to null in the databse for that field:

conn.AddParam("@birthDate", birthDate);

birthDate is type DateTime. It's set to DateTime.MinValue; I don't see why it wouldn't take this.

Answer 1

I may not be understanding the question, but I believe January 1, 1753 is the earliest date supported by SQL Server.

Source

Answer 2

If you need to go back that far, use DateTime2. It allows you to go back as far as 1/1/0001 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb677335.aspx

Answer 3

Just a guess but it might be caused by a casting issue. Since your birthDate variable has a time component (12:00 AM), SQL might be casting it to a DateTime before its inserted into the Date field. Since 1/1/0001 is an invalid SQL DateTime it might be having problems. Try setting your @birthDate parameter to birthDate.Date instead.

Answer 4

In SQL server 2008 :

Date data type : - will allow you to store only date (YYYY-MM-DD) and as range 0001-01-01 through 9999-12-31.Its accurate to 1 day

Time data type : It stores in the format hh:mm:ss:nnnnnnn , with range 00:00:00.0000000 through 23:59:59:9999999 and is accurate to 100 nanoseconds

DateTime2 : the format is YYYY-MM_DD hh:mm:ss:nnnnnnnm with a range 0001-01-01 00:00:00.0000000 through 999-12-31:59 9999999,accuracy is 100 nano seconds

DateTimeOffset:It includes additional information to track the time zone.The format is YYYY-MM-DD hh:mm:ss[.nnnnnnn][+/-]hh:mm with a range of 0001-01-01 00:00:00.000000 through 9999-12-31 23:59:50.9999999.storage 8 yo 10 bytes.

Answer 5

DateTime is a value type. Therefore if a DateTime variable hasn't been assigned it's value would be the default one which happens to be DateTime.MinValue. That's why when you explicitly set your birthDate to DateTime.MinValue it's treated as it was not assigned at all (eg as null) and thus gets replaced by the default value for that parameter in your stored proc.