How to Populate a MySQL Table with a Date Range?

Generating a Date Series in MySQL

Database programming often requires creating tables populated with a sequence of dates. This is useful for various applications, such as tracking daily data or creating calendar-based systems.

MySQL Stored Procedure for Date Population

The following MySQL stored procedure efficiently populates a table with a date range:

<code class="language-sql">DROP PROCEDURE IF EXISTS populate_date_range;
DELIMITER //
CREATE PROCEDURE populate_date_range(IN start_date DATE, IN end_date DATE)
BEGIN
  DECLARE current_date DATE;
  SET current_date = start_date;
  WHILE current_date <= end_date DO
    INSERT INTO tablename (date_column) VALUES (current_date);
    SET current_date = DATE_ADD(current_date, INTERVAL 1 DAY);
  END WHILE;
END //
DELIMITER ;</code>

This procedure, populate_date_range, takes a start date and an end date as input. It iteratively inserts each date into the date_column of the tablename table until the end_date is reached.

Handling Existing Data

For situations where you need to avoid duplicate date entries, you can modify the procedure to check for existing dates before insertion:

<code class="language-sql">DROP PROCEDURE IF EXISTS populate_date_range_no_duplicates;
DELIMITER //
CREATE PROCEDURE populate_date_range_no_duplicates(IN start_date DATE, IN end_date DATE)
BEGIN
  DECLARE current_date DATE;
  SET current_date = start_date;
  WHILE current_date <= end_date DO
    IF NOT EXISTS (SELECT 1 FROM tablename WHERE date_column = current_date) THEN
      INSERT INTO tablename (date_column) VALUES (current_date);
    END IF;
    SET current_date = DATE_ADD(current_date, INTERVAL 1 DAY);
  END WHILE;
END //
DELIMITER ;</code>

This revised procedure, populate_date_range_no_duplicates, includes a check using NOT EXISTS to prevent insertion of duplicate dates. Remember to replace tablename and date_column with your actual table and column names.

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