[IMPALA-3504] Add utc_timestamp() function for current timestamp in UTC

• Type: New Feature
• Status: Resolved
• Priority: Minor
• Resolution: Fixed
• Affects Version/s: Impala 2.5.0
• Fix Version/s: Impala 2.10.0
• Component/s: Backend
• Labels: built-in-function ramp-up
• Epic Link: Timestamp Compatibility
• Target Version: Product Backlog
• Assignee: Bikramjeet Vig
• Reporter: kuduser
• Created: 10/May/16 01:14
• Updated: 02/Oct/17 22:34
• Resolved: 06/Jul/17 23:24

Description

Impala badly needs a way to generate a UTC timestamp.

Current there does not appear to be such a way.

unix_timestamp() does not actually return a timestamp, but a epoch time as an integer.

Trying to convert this to a timestamp using cast() or from_unixtime() fail because they both convert to Local time.

This could be implemented either as a timezone argument to now() or from_unixtime(), so we can ask for a timestamp in UTC.

Yes, there is a to_utc_timestamp() function, but that requires you to specify the timezone of the timestamp you are converting from.

I just want something like current_utctimestamp().