You really should probably do an update time stamp as a trigger. If you don't know how to do triggers tell me what language your doing the code in and maybe I can help. ken -----Original Message----- From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Alex Hall Sent: Thursday, March 17, 2011 4:09 PM To: programmingblind Subject: mysql table definition question: dates Hi all, I am doing a small cms-type project for a databases class. A few of my tables need "date created" fields, which is fine: dateCreated timeStamp now() However, I also want to store the date/time of the record's most recent update. When an article is modified, for example, its lastModified date should be updated when the update is complete, but its dateCreated should remain unchanged. Of course, upon initial creation, dateCreated and dateModified should be identical, but only dateModified will change from there on. I am hoping to be able to do this automatically instead of using php, but I am having a very hard time finding a simple answer in the docs or google. Can anyone just provide the basic syntax for something like this? TIA. -- Have a great day, Alex (msg sent from GMail website) mehgcap@xxxxxxxxx; http://www.facebook.com/mehgcap __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind