How to convert text (data type) to a date (data type)?

[dsabsi]

Hello guys, 

I need your help with converting a text column towards a data type. 

Should i add a column with a certain formula to achieve this? 

See below the error that I'm getting from this: 

Many thanks!!!

Cheers,

DSabsi 

[Nari1998]

Hi All,

I'm stuck at creating a custom date column.
So the thing is i have a date column which is in text datatype as following 09-01-24 (which should be date as in 9 January 2024) and when converting into date it gives error on some dates.

How can i fix this in pq?

[v-shex-msft]

Hi @dsabsi,

It will be help if you share some sample data or date structure.

Regards,

Xiaoxin Sheng

[dsabsi]

Hi Guys @v-shex-msft@SivaMani@MarcelBeug@blopez11, 

I found out that the text value is an epoch value in a text value. 

Do you know how to convert an epoch value in a text format to dates value in date format? 

Cheers, 

DSabsi

[MarcelBeug · Accepted solution]

Sure (I included some Dutch as well 🙂 😞

let
    Source = #table(type table[Verwachte_Start = text],{{"1499032800"},{"1498860000"},{"1493589600"},{"1491170400"}}),
    AddedUTCDateTime = Table.AddColumn(Source, "Verwachte_startdatum/tijd_UTC", each #datetimezone(1970,1,1,0,0,0,0,0) + #duration(0,0,0,Number.From([Verwachte_Start])), type datetimezone),
    AddedLocalDate = Table.AddColumn(AddedUTCDateTime, "Verwachte_startdatum_lokaal", each Date.From([#"Verwachte_startdatum/tijd_UTC"]), type date)
in
    AddedLocalDate

[dsabsi]

Hi @MarcelBeug, 

Thank you for your solution, you're great!

I also learned that an alternative to this is: 

1. Convert the text to a number by the following formula (creat new column) : Verwachte start number = value([verwachte_start] )/(60*60*24) 

2. Convert the value to a year date format (create new column) : Verwachte StartJaar = YEAR(IF([Verwachte start number] = BLANK() ;BLANK();DATEVALUE("01/01/1970") + [Verwachte start number])) 

Cheers, 

DSabsi

[dsabsi]

Hi @MarcelBeug, 

Thank you for your answer (and of course in Dutch 😉 I appreciate that. 

Should I try your formula in a column or through edit-queries? 

Cheers, 

DSabsi

[MarcelBeug]

My solutions are always (99.9%) via Edit Queries.

[SivaMani]

HI @dsabsi

Go to query editor and create custom column with the following formula,

Date.FromText([DateField],Corresponding culture code)

Regards,

Siva

[MarcelBeug]

@SivaMani How do you know that the culture code should be "en-GB", without any information from @dsabsi how his dates look like?

Just to give an impression: below some date formats for April 1, 2017, and the number of culture codes using that format:

[SivaMani]

@MarcelBeug In my experience, Power BI's default date format is MM/DD/YYYY - Because of Locale(by default) in English(United State).  

GB's date format is DD/MM/YYYY.

According to your sample date formats,

4th (2017-04-01) and 6th(4/1/2017) formats will be detected as a date by Power BI.

The Rest of them, we have to convert it to the required format. Since it is in English(GB) format. So I have used "en-GB"

I hope I've made it clear enough. 

If you have anything apart from this, just tell me it will be helpful.

Thanks,

Siva

[MarcelBeug]

The default depends on your Regional Settings in Windows when you create a new Power BI Desktop file.

Again: we didn't get any information how the dates look like, so we just don't know and can only guess.

Just to give you an idea: there are almost 600 different culture codes, that may influence formats (dates, numbers, of course names of days and months) and even the A-Z sort order, e.g. Hawaii puts the vowels up front:

Otherwise of course not all cultures use the characters A-Z as their alphabet.

[SivaMani]

@MarcelBeug Thank you so much for your valuable information. 

[blopez11]

Can you give us a sample of what your text data looks like and what data type you are trying to convert it to?  That would help in providing an answer

[dsabsi]

Hello guys, 

My apologies for my late response. 

Hereby the sample of the data that I got from my boss:

The format is text and I wish to change it to dates. 

I hope you can help me, I'm really astonished by the amount of replies (many thanks!!!!)

Cheers, 

DSabsi