SQL Server video to test what an application would do in the past or in the future

By: Andy Novick   |   Updated: 2014-08-26   |   Comments   |   Related: > Testing

Problem / Solution

Testing T-SQL application code that has time dependencies can be a very difficult and error prone task. By borrowing a technique from Test-Driven-Development and using a mock-time instead of the real time it becomes easy to test how a stored procedure or function would behave at some other time in the past or the future. This is done by replacing calls to getdate() from within application code with a function that returns the mock-time when run during a test.

Key Learning Items

• How to create your own current date/time using a date in the past or future
• Examples using DATEPART, DATEFROMPARTS, DATEADD
• Learn about CONTEXT_INFO()

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About the author

Andy Novick is a SQL Server Developer in the Boston area with 25 years of database and application development experience.

This author pledges the content of this article is based on professional experience and not AI generated.

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