04/04/04
04/04/04
(OP)
So April 4th is coming up, which made me think of the date: 04/04/04. Around here we have been struggling since 2001 with a way to ensure a consistent date strategy so that everyone knows when you are talking about. The solution could be to incorporate the date in its shortened form, but many of our antiquated programs only offer numbers for entering dates.
My question is, what, if any, is the most universal standard for dates: mm/dd/yy, dd/mm/yy, yy/mm/dd or something else?
My question is, what, if any, is the most universal standard for dates: mm/dd/yy, dd/mm/yy, yy/mm/dd or something else?





RE: 04/04/04
RE: 04/04/04
I write out the month whenever I can, and I use a four digit year. This is the only thing that is reliably clear.
How many people out there are absolutely clear on American versus European date numbers, especially when you are from Canada, like I am?
Consider the ISO date which goes YY/MM/DD. This even sorts on your computer whne you use them in filenames.
JHG
RE: 04/04/04
If, however, you are suggesting this woudl be a good opportunity for us all to switch to the same convention....
JMW
www.viscoanalyser.com
RE: 04/04/04
Ray Reynolds
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?
RE: 04/04/04
Good Luck
johnwm
RE: 04/04/04
David
RE: 04/04/04
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RE: 04/04/04
As usual, we have every man and his dog inventing his own conventions and some not even abiding by their own conventions.
If Bill Gates wanted to he could end all this confusion by only giving us one date format option.
JMW
www.viscoanalyser.com
RE: 04/04/04
April 4, 2004
4 avril 2004
etc.
Any doubt what date I am referring to?
I refuse to use 03/02/05 for any of the 3 possible dates this denotes. Why am I the only one?
The antiquated programs should be modified, or replaced.
tg
RE: 04/04/04
I agree, but a lot of people are hung up on certain date types. It is very hard to change. Gov't agencies need to step up and mandate a change..IMO.
RE: 04/04/04
A month is still a bigger unit than a day is.
Using your logic would give us mm.ss.hh for minutes, seconds and hours. That would not be very practical.
The ISO way using yyyy-mm-dd is accepted in large parts of Europe. It is mathematically correct, non-ambiguous and makes calculation and sorting safe and easy.
RE: 04/04/04
I worked for the Canadian military and they use a slight variation of the navy date system mentioned above. It’s not 13Apr04 but 13 Apr 04. (Spaces make it more readable)
The difference between 1904 and 2004 can usually be determined by content. If it’s unclear then use 13 Apr 1904.
Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng
Construction Project Management
From conception to completion
www.kitsonengineering.com
RE: 04/04/04
Did you think avril was a typo. error? In case that's what you thought, avril is french for April. Here in Canada, we have 2 official languages to complicate matters...
Agree with RDK...
Cheers
tg
RE: 04/04/04
There's easy solutions to this, but people will insist on keeping their "comfortable" formats.
David
RE: 04/04/04
But it is interesting to note that the easy solution requires that we adopt a standard, and that we adhere to that standard. Easier said than done. Even within these discussions, there are those who are against any standardization as it is deemed to be an erosion of their freedom of speech.
RE: 04/04/04
TTFN
RE: 04/04/04
RE: 04/04/04
I have never used the Julian calendar for daily activities. It seems that it would complicate life considerably. I still use the 24-hour clock, and I usually have to explain myself when someone asks me for the time. I have become so accustomed to saying, i.e. it 1830 instead of 6:30pm that I forget to convert when speaking to folks who are not aware of 24-hour time.
Good Thread --- a standard worldwide would be nice but I don't see it coming in the near future.
Regards,
ietech
RE: 04/04/04
Start with January at your leftmost knuckle and then Feb. is the next valley between knuckles, then the next knuckle (peak) is March etc.
July and Aug. are on peaks as you go from one hand to the next. It works...
tg
RE: 04/04/04
Thanks, and a Star for trainguy
RE: 04/04/04
Clench your left-hand, count your fore finger-knuckle as January, work down to the pinky-knuckle (1st valley between fore-finger and middle knuckle is Feb, next knuckle is March, etc), then count that twice (July... August (same number of days)) and work your way back to the fore finger-knuckle.
Ray Reynolds
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?
RE: 04/04/04
I know that early astronomers / astrologers (there wasn't really a distinction back then) tried to tie the lunar month (of approximately 27.322 days) to the solar year (of about 365.26 days), even though they knew that there were not an exact number of days in a lunar month, nor an exact number of days or lunar months in a solar year.
However, if I was given the job of rationalising 365.26 days into 12 months, I would have come up with 7 months with 30 days and 5 with 31, and in a leap year you would have 6 of each.
Why do we have just one short month? (Os is that just too anally retentive of me?)
RE: 04/04/04
RE: 04/04/04
RE: 04/04/04
http://www.cs.umanitoba.ca/~djc/startrek/stardates/
... I think it will be used, in the future!
Bye to all, 'NGL
RE: 04/04/04
But they didn't go all the way. They still seem to have a problem with the dates.
RE: 04/04/04
Can you image if we now have to re-learn all of the constants and formula because the basic unit of time has changed?
RE: 04/04/04
I think it will take some time before the Swiss reach world dominance. You can surely continue using fathoms per eye-blink (or what you are using for speed-of-light in the non-metric countries) for quite a while
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RE: 04/04/04
299,792,458 m/s or 186,000 mi/s.
Changing the basic unit of time to a base 10 interval, as appealing as it sounds, would have far reaching consequences, not all negative, but far reaching nonetheless.