SQL Server: Cannot insert an explicit value into a timestamp column

Question

When using this statement

create table demo (
    ts timestamp
)

insert into demo select current_timestamp

I get the following error:

Answer 1

How to insert current time into a timestamp with SQL Server:

Answer: You can't, and here's why.

In newer versions of SQL Server, timestamp is renamed to RowVersion. Rightly so, because timestamp is very misleading.

SQL Server timestamp IS NOT set by the user and does not represent a date or time. timestamp is just a binary representation of a consecutive number, it's only good for making sure a row hasn't changed since it's been read.

If you want to store a date or a time, do not use timestamp, you must use one of the other datatypes, like for example datetime, smalldatetime, date, time or DATETIME2

For example:

create table wtf (
    id INT,
    leet timestamp
)

insert into wtf (id) values (15)

select * from wtf

15    0x00000000000007D3 

So timestamp is some kind of binary number. What if we try casting it to datetime?

select CAST(leet AS datetime) from wtf

1900-01-01 00:00:06.677

The current year for me is not 1900. So I'm not sure what SQL Server is thinking.