PHP : Convert string to timestamp or datestamp before storing to database(MariaDB/MySQL)

Problem :

Need to convert a date string in PHP before storing the date into database(MariaDB/MySQL). The field in table is of type timestamp and the format is 0000-00-00 00:00:00. How to do that?

Solution :

Use strtotime() function to convert the string to timestamp in PHP. Then adjust the timestamp to 0000-00-00 00:00:00 format with the date() function.

For example :

 $str := "12-09-2015";
 $date_str = strtotime($str);
 $store_to_sql_date = date( 'Y-m-d H:i:s', $datestr );