ORA-01861: literal does not match format string

Question

Hi everybody,

cmd.CommandText = "SELECT alarm_id,definition_description,element_id,
TO_CHAR (alarm_datetime, 'YYYY-MM-DD HH24:MI:SS'),severity,
problem_text,status FROM aircom.alarms 
WHERE status = 1 and 
TO_DATE (alarm_datetime,'DD.MM.YYYY HH24:MI:SS') > TO_DATE ('07.09.2008 
09:43:00', 'DD.MM.YYYY HH24:MI:SS') 
order 
by ALARM_DATETIME desc";

i get ORA-01861 error when i try to execute this command text. there is no problems with database connection because i can execute basic sql commands.

What is the problem with this statement?

Answer 1

Remove the TO_DATE in the WHERE clause

TO_DATE (alarm_datetime,'DD.MM.YYYY HH24:MI:SS')

and change the code to

alarm_datetime

The error comes from to_date conversion of a date column.

Added Explanation: Oracle converts your alarm_datetime into a string using its nls depended date format. After this it calls to_date with your provided date mask. This throws the exception.

Answer 2

The error means that you tried to enter a literal with a format string, but the length of the format string was not the same length as the literal.

One of these formats is incorrect:

TO_CHAR(t.alarm_datetime, 'YYYY-MM-DD HH24:MI:SS')
TO_DATE(alarm_datetime, 'DD.MM.YYYY HH24:MI:SS')