Add timestamps to an existing table

Question

I need to add timestamps (created_at & updated_at) to an existing table. I tried the following code but it didn\'t work.

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Answer 1

A lot of answers here, but I'll post mine too because none of the previous ones really worked for me :)

As some have noted, #add_timestamps unfortunately adds the null: false restriction, which will cause old rows to be invalid because they don't have these values populated. Most answers here suggest that we set some default value (Time.zone.now), but I wouldn't like to do that because these default timestamps for old data will not be correct. I don't see the value in adding incorrect data to the table.

So my migration was simply:

class AddTimestampsToUser < ActiveRecord::Migration
  def change_table
    add_column :projects, :created_at, :datetime
    add_column :projects, :updated_at, :datetime
  end
end

No null: false, no other restrictions. Old rows will continue being valid with created_at as NULL, and update_at as NULL (until some update is performed to the row). New rows will have created_at and updated_at populated as expected.