[uf-discuss] Formatting arbitrary dates, not part of hCalendar

[Andy Mabbett]

In message <45F129FE.8080306 at xtra.co.nz>, Paul Wilkins 
<pmw57 at xtra.co.nz> writes

> you might write the date as 4/7/76 and force the reader to find and 
>use the abbreviation, but as someone who cares enough to create a 
>datetime design pattern, it should be obvious that writing the date as 
>July 4, 1776 solves the problem.

That's not always going to be feasible; consider tabular data, or 
verbatim quotations for instance.

>Another trouble is that with the arbitrary datetime pattern in use, how 
>can the machine benefit from that information. It's not immediately 
>clear.

It's not just the machines that might benefit. A semantically marked-up 
date can be presented according to the users preferences. Given 
2007-03-04, you might prefer to see March 4th 2007, where I prefer 4 
March 2007 (see, for comparison, the user setting for dates in 
Wikipedia).

-- 
Andy Mabbett
                  <http://www.pigsonthewing.org.uk/uFsig/>

                     Welcome to the world's longest week!