Date formats & ISO Standards

[Brandon Nelson]

I'd like to make a case (repeating a message from 2003-11-11) for using
ISO standardized date formats within Calendar, if not simply providing
the user the option to do so.

The ISO-standard date format is yyyy-mm-dd. In a date that begins with a
four-digit year, there is _no way_ to confuse month with day. (The
hypothetical format *yyyy-dd-mm is never used).

So in the day view:

Monday
2004/04/05

is unambiguous. This neatly sidesteps all problems arising from
conflicting North American/European formats. (Calendar _is_ about
standards, right?)

ADDED BONUS: yyyy-mm-dd dates are sortable!

Brandon

[Paul Berendsen]

Here are some www-sources of information and arguments about the
standard date (and time) notation (ISO 8601).
The most appropriate date notation for today would be "2004-04-17".

(Brandon, your "2004/04/05" does not accord to any standard,
so it is not unambiguous.)
Paul Berendsen


Use international date format (ISO)
(W3C Quality Assurance)
http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/iso-date

A Summary of the International Standard Date and Time Notation,
by Markus Kuhn
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/iso-time.html

Info on ISO 8601, the date and time representation standard,
by Jukka "Yucca" Korpela
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/iso8601.html

Campaign to get the Internet World to use the International Date Format,
by Steve Adams, IDFC.
http://www.saqqara.demon.co.uk/datefmt.htm

"Do you wish to download your own copy of the full ISO8601 standard?
Unfortunately, you cannot download your own copy of the latest
version of the standard unless you pay some money to ISO.
Seems pretty daft to me - if you want a worldwide standard to
be adopted it should be freely available to everyone who could
possibly want to use it...."
I'd like to make a case (repeating a message from 2003-11-11) for using
ISO standardized date formats within Calendar, if not simply providing
the user the option to do so.
The ISO-standard date format is yyyy-mm-dd. In a date that begins with a
four-digit year, there is _no way_ to confuse month with day. (The
hypothetical format *yyyy-dd-mm is never used).
Monday
2004/04/05
is unambiguous.

[Michiel van Leeuwen]

Post by Brandon Nelson
I'd like to make a case (repeating a message from 2003-11-11) for using
ISO standardized date formats within Calendar, if not simply providing
the user the option to do so.

And why not just use the system locale date format? Just do what the
users wants. Users are not used to the iso date format. I never see it
in real live. Only the local date format.

Michiel

[Martin Bagge]

Post by Michiel van Leeuwen

Post by Brandon Nelson
I'd like to make a case (repeating a message from 2003-11-11) for
using ISO standardized date formats within Calendar, if not simply
providing the user the option to do so.

And why not just use the system locale date format? Just do what the
users wants. Users are not used to the iso date format. I never see it
in real live. Only the local date format.

In sweden we do use the ISOstandard as dateformat in every day life.
Even for social security numbers that is based of the day of birth and a
four digit checksum(well not really but that doesn't matter=)).

[Michiel van Leeuwen]

Post by Martin Bagge

Post by Michiel van Leeuwen
And why not just use the system locale date format? Just do what the
users wants. Users are not used to the iso date format. I never see it
in real live. Only the local date format.

In sweden we do use the ISOstandard as dateformat in every day life.
Even for social security numbers that is based of the day of birth and a
four digit checksum(well not really but that doesn't matter=)).

But I don't live in Sweden :)
Anyway, i am strongly against not using what the users wants and what
every other program does (or at least should), including mozilla itself.
Because someone from the US isn't used to dutch dates doesn't mean a
someone from .nl can't use his own date format, does it?
And it shouldn't be because it is easier to program. there is
nsIScriptableDateFormat, which makes it real easy to get a correct date
string.

Michiel

[Martin Bagge]

Post by Michiel van Leeuwen

Post by Martin Bagge

Post by Michiel van Leeuwen
And why not just use the system locale date format? Just do what the
users wants. Users are not used to the iso date format. I never see it
in real live. Only the local date format.

In sweden we do use the ISOstandard as dateformat in every day life.
Even for social security numbers that is based of the day of birth and a
four digit checksum(well not really but that doesn't matter=)).

But I don't live in Sweden :)
Anyway, i am strongly against not using what the users wants and what
every other program does (or at least should), including mozilla itself.

Of course the system locale would be the way to go, the thing I was
pointing to in the post was "Users are not used to the iso date format",
that's completly wrong. Many countries in Europe uses the ISOformat and
that makes millions of potential users who is familiar with the format.
In that case thhe statement that users doesn't recognizes ISOdates fails.

[Karl Ove Hufthammer]

Post by Brandon Nelson
I'd like to make a case (repeating a message from 2003-11-11)
for using ISO standardized date formats within Calendar, if
not simply providing the user the option to do so.

I agree.

Post by Brandon Nelson
Monday
2004/04/05

Surely you mean 2004-04-05.

[Brandon Nelson]

Post by Paul Berendsen
Here are some www-sources of information and arguments about the
standard date (and time) notation (ISO 8601).
The most appropriate date notation for today would be "2004-04-17".
(Brandon, your "2004/04/05" does not accord to any standard,
so it is not unambiguous.)
Paul Berendsen

Yes, yes, dashes not slashes. (That sounds like it belongs on a picket
sign! Accompanied by the chant "Hey hey, ho ho, ddmmyy has got to go")
But beginning with a four-digit year, to the human reader at least, does
stipulate that month, then day, follow.

[u***@domain.invalid]

Post by Paul Berendsen
Here are some www-sources of information and arguments about the
standard date (and time) notation (ISO 8601).
The most appropriate date notation for today would be "2004-04-17".
(Brandon, your "2004/04/05" does not accord to any standard,
so it is not unambiguous.)
Paul Berendsen

Yes, yes, dashes not slashes. (That sounds like it belongs on a picket
sign! Accompanied by the chant "Hey hey, ho ho, ddmmyy has got to go")
But beginning with a four-digit year, to the human reader at least, does
stipulate that month, then day, follow.

[Mooquackwoftweetmeow]

Post by Brandon Nelson
I'd like to make a case (repeating a message from 2003-11-11) for using
ISO standardized date formats within Calendar, if not simply providing
the user the option to do so.

Sunbird 2004-04-07
(ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/calendar/sunbird/nightly/latest/)
uses my OS date format (which just so happens to be ISO)

[David A. Desrosiers]

Post by Brandon Nelson
Monday
2004/04/05

So is that April 5th, 2004, or June 4th, 2004?

Depending which country you are from, you can mistake it for either, and
I've seen both referenced in the same source mail archives/etc.

[Mooquackwoftweetmeow]

Post by David A. Desrosiers

Post by Brandon Nelson
Monday
2004/04/05

So is that April 5th, 2004, or June 4th, 2004?
Depending which country you are from, you can mistake it for either, and
I've seen both referenced in the same source mail archives/etc.

ISO says it's "2004 April 5th" - YYYY-DD-MM isn't in use anywhere;
besides putting the smallest value in the *middle* would just be daft
now, wouldn't it? ;)