# Date parsing problem
**URL:** https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030
**Category:** Logstash
**Created:** [April 13, 2018, 11:04pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030 "2018-04-13T23:04:25Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@arisbanach](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/arisbanach)
#### Post date: [April 13, 2018, 11:04pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/1 "2018-04-13T23:04:25Z")
I don't know why, but the date filter is not parsing the date field and I don't see any error logs regarding it. The docs do have the `_dateparsefailure` tag though. My config:
```auto
xml {
source => "message"
xpath => ["/element/date/text()", "date"]
store_xml => false
}
date {
match => ["date", "yyyyMMdd"]
target => "date"
}
```
The date fields are all like `20180425`. Any ideas why this is happened?
---
### Author:  [@Mike.Barretta](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Mike.Barretta)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 1:37pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/2 "2018-04-14T13:37:45Z")
@arisbanach if you run it through with the following output, what do you see?
```auto
output { stdout { codec => rubydebug } }
```
---
### Author:  [@arisbanach](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/arisbanach)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 2:24pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/4 "2018-04-14T14:24:36Z")
@Mike.Barretta The output shows the same as what I see in Kibana. There isn't anything extra that I can see that explains why it fails to parse.
---
### Author:  [@Badger](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Badger)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 3:41pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/5 "2018-04-14T15:41:55Z")
> [@arisbanach](#):
>
> Any ideas why this is happened?
Date is an array. Try this (force\_array =\> false on the xml filter does not stop path making everything an array).
```auto
date { match => ["date[0]", "yyyyMMdd"] target => "date" }
```
---
### Author:  [@arisbanach](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/arisbanach)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 4:02pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/6 "2018-04-14T16:02:34Z")
@Badger You're right! However, when I set `force_array => false` in the xml filter, it still outputs date as an array for some reason.
---
### Author:  [@arisbanach](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/arisbanach)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 4:07pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/7 "2018-04-14T16:07:05Z")
Actually, this might be related to the `xpath` value I'm using to pull it. This has been happening with other fields as well, so I'm guess I'm just not understanding something about xpaths. Is there a way that I can concatenate multiple matches so that the output isn't stored in an array? Or will I need to use a different filter afterward to do that?
---
### Author:  [@Badger](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Badger)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 4:58pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/8 "2018-04-14T16:58:37Z")
force\_array =\> false works for store\_xml, but not for xpath. If you look at the [source](https://github.com/logstash-plugins/logstash-filter-xml/blob/master/lib/logstash/filters/xml.rb) it is not even referenced in the if @xpath block, just in the if @store\_xml block.
---
### Author:  [@arisbanach](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/arisbanach)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 5:08pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/9 "2018-04-14T17:08:01Z")
So would you say a good way to handle this is just use another filter after the xml filter to merge any fields that are arrays into non-arrays first?
---
### Author:  [@Badger](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Badger)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 5:43pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/10 "2018-04-14T17:43:43Z")
Yes. I tend to do this for each field. It is ugly but effective.
```auto
if [fieldx] { mutate { replace => { "fieldx" => "%{[fieldx][0]}" } } }
```
---
### Author:  [@arisbanach](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/arisbanach)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 6:06pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/11 "2018-04-14T18:06:20Z")
Thanks! You're amazing! How long have you been doing this for, if you don't mind me asking? I don't know if there is a normal learning curve with Logstash or if I'm just slow.
---
### Author:  [@Mike.Barretta](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Mike.Barretta)
#### Post date: [April 14, 2018, 6:55pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/12 "2018-04-14T18:55:32Z")
Thanks for jumping in and help out!
---
### Author:  [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)
#### Post date: [May 12, 2018, 6:56pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/date-parsing-problem/128030/13 "2018-05-12T18:56:01Z")
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