# Disable \`auto\_now\_add\` temporarily in a command

**URL:** <https://forum.djangoproject.com/t/disable-auto-now-add-temporarily-in-a-command/35835>\
**Category:** Getting Started\
**Created:** [October 21, 2024, 2:26pm UTC](https://forum.djangoproject.com/t/disable-auto-now-add-temporarily-in-a-command/35835 "2024-10-21T14:26:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![PierreMDL](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/forum.djangoproject.com/pierremdl/32/22473_2.png) [@PierreMDL](https://forum.djangoproject.com/u/PierreMDL)\
**Post date:** [October 21, 2024, 2:26pm UTC](https://forum.djangoproject.com/t/disable-auto-now-add-temporarily-in-a-command/35835/1 "2024-10-21T14:26:14Z")

</div>

Hello everybody, sorry I don’t know exactly in which forum to ask that question.

Here is a simple model for a user action:

```python
class UserAction(models.Model):
    action = models.CharField(...)
    created_at = models.DateTimeField(auto_now_add=True)

```

For development purpose, I want to make a command to run periodically that fakes user activity throughout the day. In other words, daily at say 8:00 in the morning, my script will bulk create like thousands of `UserAction` rows for the day, each with different fake `created_at` values.

The problem is, `auto_now_add` doesn’t let me save a date manually. Instead, the value will always be the date of creation of the row. `auto_now_add` is a requirement that cannot be permanently removed from the model.

How could I sort of disable that behaviour just the time it takes to run that script? Basically what I’d see for my command is something like this:

@transaction.atomic

1. create UserAction instances
2. disable `auto_now_add`
3. bulk create UserAction rows
4. enable `auto_now_add`

Is that doable?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![boxed](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/forum.djangoproject.com/boxed/32/11975_2.png) [@boxed](https://forum.djangoproject.com/u/boxed)\
**Post date:** [October 21, 2024, 2:42pm UTC](https://forum.djangoproject.com/t/disable-auto-now-add-temporarily-in-a-command/35835/2 "2024-10-21T14:42:53Z")

</div>

```pycon
In [3]: r = ReportedTime.objects.all().first()

In [4]: r.ts
Out[4]: datetime.datetime(2023, 10, 5, 12, 47, 55, 425039, tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc)

In [5]: r.ts = now()

In [6]: r.save()

In [7]: r.refresh_from_db()

In [8]: r.ts
Out[8]: datetime.datetime(2024, 10, 21, 14, 42, 13, 431365, tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc)

```

Looks to me like you can edit them just fine. What is the problem you’re having?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![PierreMDL](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/forum.djangoproject.com/pierremdl/32/22473_2.png) [@PierreMDL](https://forum.djangoproject.com/u/PierreMDL)\
**Post date:** [October 21, 2024, 3:10pm UTC](https://forum.djangoproject.com/t/disable-auto-now-add-temporarily-in-a-command/35835/3 "2024-10-21T15:10:58Z")

</div>

I’m having the behaviour as described here in the docs:

> **[Model field reference | Django documentation](https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/5.1/ref/models/fields/#django.db.models.DateField.auto_now_add)**
>
> The web framework for perfectionists with deadlines.

Maybe I can still overwrite the field after creation of the row, but it seems not at creation of the row, or at least not using `bulk_create`.

```python
# Create
>>> unique_actions = [UserAction(created_at="2010-01-01", action="unique action") for x in range(10)]
>>> UserAction.objects.bulk_create(unique_actions)

# Get
>>> unique_actions = UserAction.objects.filter(action="unique action").values_list("created_at__date", flat=True)
>>> pprint(list(unique_actions))
[datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21),
 datetime.date(2024, 10, 21)]

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![KenWhitesell](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/forum.djangoproject.com/kenwhitesell/32/280_2.png) [@KenWhitesell](https://forum.djangoproject.com/u/KenWhitesell)\
**Post date:** [October 21, 2024, 4:10pm UTC](https://forum.djangoproject.com/t/disable-auto-now-add-temporarily-in-a-command/35835/4 "2024-10-21T16:10:59Z")

</div>

> [@PierreMDL](#):
>
> Maybe I can still overwrite the field after creation of the row, but it seems not at creation of the row, or at least not using `bulk_create`.

That is correct, as far as creating the objects using the ORM. You could create those rows with custom values if you created them using raw sql.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![PierreMDL](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/forum.djangoproject.com/pierremdl/32/22473_2.png) [@PierreMDL](https://forum.djangoproject.com/u/PierreMDL)\
**Post date:** [October 21, 2024, 4:28pm UTC](https://forum.djangoproject.com/t/disable-auto-now-add-temporarily-in-a-command/35835/5 "2024-10-21T16:28:25Z")

</div>

Hi Ken, as always thanks for super fast reply.

Actually it looks like the answer was super simple. Contrary to my assumption, `auto_now_add` is not enforced at DB level. So just “disable” it in the model field in the script.

```python
# my_script.py
# Prepare
>>> UserAction.created_at.field.auto_now_add = False

# Create
>>> unique_actions = [UserAction(created_at="2010-01-01", action="unique action") for x in range(10)]
>>> UserAction.objects.bulk_create(unique_actions)

# Get
>>> unique_actions = UserAction.objects.filter(action="unique action").values_list("created_at__date", flat=True)
>>> pprint(list(unique_actions))
 [datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1),
 datetime.date(2010, 1, 1)]

# Exit

```