11. Date and Time Functions

Time handling is a common source of production bugs. This module focuses on PostgreSQL best practices for storing, formatting, and querying time safely.

Decision Guide

Need	Prefer	Notes
Date only	date	No time component
Event timestamp	timestamptz	Stores an absolute instant
Reporting buckets	date_trunc(...)	Day/week/month grouping
Durations	interval	Safe time arithmetic
Display formatting	to_char(...)	Formatting for reports

Lessons

• Current Date and Time Functions
• Formatting and Parsing Dates
• Date Arithmetic and Difference

What's Next

• Continue to 12. Views