I’m working on a CakePHP application where I save dates into a MariaDB database. The absent_date
field is of type DATE
. However, I’ve encountered a peculiar issue:
- When I save
2024-12-30
, it gets stored as2025-12-30
. - When I save
2024-12-29
, it works as expected and remains2024-12-29
.
My application is set to use the Indian timezone (Asia/Kolkata
). Here’s the table structure for reference:
CREATE TABLE attendance_details (
id INT(11) AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
student_id INT(11) NOT NULL,
year_id INT(11) NOT NULL,
absent_date DATE NOT NULL
);
Here is my bulkUpload
method:
public function bulkUpload($data = array())
{
$entities = $this->newEntities($data);
dd($entities); // Debugging the entities
$this->saveMany($entities);
return true;
}
Debug output for 2024-12-30
:
array:3 [
0 => Entity {#255 ▼
#_properties: array:3 [▼
"student_id" => 1
"year_id" => 7
"absent_date" => "2024-12-30"
]
#_original: []
#_hidden: []
#_virtual: []
#_className: null
#_dirty: array:3 [▶]
#_new: true
#_errors: []
#_invalid: []
#_accessible: array:1 [▶]
#_registryAlias: "AttendanceDetails"
student_id: 1
year_id: 7
absent_date: "2024-12-30"
[new]: true
[accessible]: array:1 [▶]
[dirty]: array:3 [▶]
[original]: []
[virtual]: []
[hasErrors]: false
[errors]: []
[invalid]: []
[repository]: "AttendanceDetails"
}
]
Observations:
- If I directly store the date into the database using a manual query, it is stored correctly as
2024-12-30
. - This issue seems to occur only when storing data through CakePHP.
- I suspect it might be related to timezone conversions or the way CakePHP handles
DATE
fields.
Temporary workaround:
It works fine if I change the datatype of absent_date
to VARCHAR
, but I want to retain the DATE
datatype for proper date handling and querying.
Question:
Has anyone encountered a similar issue or knows how to resolve this while keeping the DATE
datatype?
2
Answers
I resolved the issue by adding the following code in the bootstrap.php file:
This ensures that date fields are parsed and formatted correctly throughout the application. I also removed the
beforeSave()
function from the model, which was sanitizing the date field and causing the date field to be stored incorrectly. With this change, date fields now work as expected. Thank you.The issue occurs because CakePHP may apply timezone adjustments when processing the date, causing unexpected shifts. By using
FrozenDate::parse()
in yourbulkUpload
method, you ensure that the date is processed without timezone conversion. Thei18nFormat('yyyy-MM-dd')
ensures the date is stored in the correct format (yyyy-MM-dd
) for MariaDB’sDATE
field. This approach prevents the date from being altered when saved.