Date and time notation

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Date and time notation around the world varies.

An approach to harmonise the different notations is the ISO 8601 standard.

Since the Internet is a main enabler of communication between people with different date notation backgrounds, and software is used to facilitate the communication, RFC standards and a W3C tips and discussion paper were published.

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A calendar date is a reference to a particular day represented within a calendar system. The calendar date allows the specific day to be identified. The number of days between two dates may be calculated. For example, "25 August 2023" is ten days after "15 August 2023". The date of a particular event depends on the observed time zone. For example, the air attack on Pearl Harbor that began at 7:48 a.m. Hawaiian time on 7 December 1941 took place at 3:18 a.m. Japan Standard Time, 8 December in Japan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ISO 8601</span> International standards for dates and times

ISO 8601 is an international standard covering the worldwide exchange and communication of date and time-related data. It is maintained by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and was first published in 1988, with updates in 1991, 2000, 2004, and 2019, and an amendment in 2022. The standard provides a well-defined, unambiguous method of representing calendar dates and times in worldwide communications, especially to avoid misinterpreting numeric dates and times when such data is transferred between countries with different conventions for writing numeric dates and times.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">24-hour clock</span> Timekeeping convention

The modern 24-hour clock, popularly referred to in the United States as militarytime, is the convention of timekeeping in which the day runs from midnight to midnight and is divided into 24 hours. This is indicated by the hours passed since midnight, from 0(:00) to 23(:59). This system, as opposed to the 12-hour clock, is the most commonly used time notation in the world today, and is used by the international standard ISO 8601.

The Internet Calendaring and Scheduling Core Object Specification (iCalendar) is a media type which allows users to store and exchange calendaring and scheduling information such as events, to-dos, journal entries, and free/busy information, and together with its associated standards has been a cornerstone of the standardization and interoperability of digital calendars across different vendors. Files formatted according to the specification usually have an extension of .ics. With supporting software, such as an email reader or calendar application, recipients of an iCalendar data file can respond to the sender easily or counter-propose another meeting date/time. The file format is specified in a proposed Internet standard for calendar data exchange. The standard and file type are sometimes referred to as "iCal", which was the name of the Apple Inc. calendar program until 2012, which provides one of the implementations of the standard.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timestamp</span> Information identifying when an event occurred

A timestamp is a sequence of characters or encoded information identifying when a certain event occurred, usually giving date and time of day, sometimes accurate to a small fraction of a second. Timestamps do not have to be based on some absolute notion of time, however. They can have any epoch, can be relative to any arbitrary time, such as the power-on time of a system, or to some arbitrary time in the past.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">JSON</span> Open standard file format and data interchange

JSON is an open standard file format and data interchange format that uses human-readable text to store and transmit data objects consisting of attribute–value pairs and arrays. It is a common data format with diverse uses in electronic data interchange, including that of web applications with servers.

A year zero does not exist in the Anno Domini (AD) calendar year system commonly used to number years in the Gregorian calendar ; in this system, the year 1 BC is followed directly by year AD 1. However, there is a year zero in both the astronomical year numbering system, and the ISO 8601:2004 system, the interchange standard for all calendar numbering systems. There is also a year zero in most Buddhist and Hindu calendars.

An IETF BCP 47 language tag is a standardized code or tag that is used to identify human languages in the Internet. The tag structure has been standardized by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) in Best Current Practice (BCP) 47; the subtags are maintained by the IANA Language Subtag Registry.

ISO 2014 is an international standard that was issued in April 1976, and superseded by ISO 8601 in June 1988. ISO 2014 was the standard that originally introduced the all-numeric date notation [YYYY]-[MM]-[DD] with the digits in order starting with the most significant digit first. It was technically identical to ISO Recommendation R 2014 from 1971.

A communication protocol is a system of rules that allows two or more entities of a communications system to transmit information via any variation of a physical quantity. The protocol defines the rules, syntax, semantics, and synchronization of communication and possible error recovery methods. Protocols may be implemented by hardware, software, or a combination of both.

Date and time notation in Canada combines conventions from the United Kingdom, conventions from the United States, and conventions from France, often creating confusion. The Government of Canada specifies the ISO 8601 format for all-numeric dates. It recommends writing the time using the 24-hour clock (21:22) for maximum clarity in both Canadian English and Canadian French, but also allows the 12-hour clock (9:22 p.m.) in English.

Date and time notation in the United States differs from that used in nearly all other countries. It is inherited from one historical branch of conventions from the United Kingdom. American styles of notation have also influenced customs of date notation in Canada, creating confusion in international commerce.

In Poland, the official system for representing dates and times follows the international ISO 8601 standard. However, in less official use, other conventions prevail, such as the day-month-year order and several Polish language abbreviations.

Date and time notation in Sweden mostly follows the ISO 8601 standard: dates are generally written in the form YYYY-MM-DD. Although this format may be abbreviated in a number of ways, almost all Swedish date notations state the month between the year and the day. Months are not capitalised when written. The week number may also be used in writing and in speech. Times are generally written using 24-hour clock notation, with full stops as separators, although 12-hour clock notation is more frequently used in speech.

Date and time notation in the United Kingdom records the date using the day–month–year format. The ISO 8601 format (1999-12-31) is increasingly used for all-numeric dates. The time can be written using either the 24-hour clock (23:59) or the 12-hour clock (11:59 pm).

The European Committee for Standardization (CEN) and (CENELEC) adopted ISO 8601 with EN 28601, now EN ISO 8601. As a European Norm, CEN and CENELEC member states are obligated to adopt the standard as national standard without alterations as well.

ISO 8601 has been adopted as BIS IS 7900:2001.

Date and time notation in Australia most commonly records the date using the day-month-year format, while the ISO 8601 format (2023-08-15) is increasingly used for all-numeric dates. The time can be written using either the 12-hour clock or the 24-hour clock (00:04).

Date and time notation in Pakistan is based on the Gregorian and Islamic calendars. Pakistan has not officially adopted any time and date representation standard based on the ISO 8601.

A GeneralizedTime is a time format in the ASN.1 notation. It consists of a string value representing the calendar date, as defined in ISO 8601, a time of day with an optional fractional seconds element and the optional local time differential factor as defined in ISO 8601.