[snip] I have a field in mysql as shown by describe contract; | length_start | date | YES | | NULL | | Which stores it in the mysql format of YYYY-MM-DD. However, I need the output of my select statement to show it in MM-DD-YYYY format. I can select it to see the date in the field: select length_start from contract where user_id = 1; +--------------+ | length_start | +--------------+ | 2006-01-12 | +--------------+ 1 row in set (0.00 sec) so then I do my date_format() select statement, but it returns a NULL value. Why? select date_format('contract.length_start', '%m-%d-%Y') as length_start from contract where user_id = 1; +--------------+ | length_start | +--------------+ | NULL | +--------------+ 1 row in set, 1 warning (0.00 sec) [/snip] Actually this is more a question for the MySQL list. Start first by taking the ticks or quotes off of the column; select date_format(contract.length_start, '%m-%d-%Y') as length_start from contract where user_id = 1; You are essentially trying to turn that text string into a date, it will not work. -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php