Recommendations on Storing Time in MySQL

MySQL & MariaDB Other MySQL® Questions
1

I would like to get some advice on storing time columns in MySQL.

We are developing a time sheet application that requires us to store checkin, checkout times, breaks in hours and minutes, but later carry out computations in decimal.

Should I use:

  • time columns and use mysql time functions for the computations
  • store the time as an integer (number of seconds since 1970 or number of hours) then show the hour/minute only for display purposes

Thanks in advance

2

I would use MySQL’s native time types and functions, because they work fine and it’s going to be a big mess if you code it yourself. But I am not sure if you need higher resolution than one second, given your mention of decimal. If so, you can use MariaDB.

3

Thanks, that was the approach I had used initially and will follow that through.