I never understood would you’d put the month first. Either the largest increment, years, or the smallest, days, but month should always be in the middle. I find that receipts I have to file by month never seem to follow any set convention from one store to the next. I’m always cross referencing and guessing if the day is less than the 12th of the month. I personally created a lovely six character date code that I’d love to see the world adopt. It’s very clear and simple. Today would be 10DE12 See? Simple! Just add letters.
I like your code, Yolanda. I think we in the US notate date that way because that’s how we use it in conversation. If you asked me the date I would say it’s December 10th, whereas I think in your culture it’s more common to say it’s the 10th of December. Maybe that’s just me though?
Usually I agree with you Yolanda, but today I have to disagree.
As a Dyslexic I find numbers relatively easy to use and remember, but letters confuse me and names impossible.
When playing games on the computer I need to save the current game before going into unpredictable/unknown territory and I use the following convention to name the save:
1. day of month
2. month
3. year
4. hour
5. minute
So this instant would be 101212_1754
I recently discovered that my Wife uses the same system when saving files at work as a computer programmer…
Of course if you want even more granularity, you could add the seconds. (I tend to use digital timepieces a lot and have a lot of ‘Atomic’ clocks. My wristwatch is a Casio ‘Wave Ceptor’ that updates it’s crystal clock with the strongest radio timepiece signal from the world-standard clocks.
ISO 8601 sets a very usable standard for date formats that makes it easier for both humans and computers to use. It goes from biggest to smallest (e.g. 2012-12-10 13:14) which is unambiguous and allows files to be sorted easily by computers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601
For Chris — March would be MR and May is MY; January is JA, June is JE, and July is JL; and April = AP and August = AG. For months like February, September, October, November, and December, where this is no other month starting with the same letter, the first two letter will work, although a single letter could also suffice
Yeah, that bugs me too. The inconsistency especially when it’s before the 13th of a month. You don’t know if 12/11/05 is December 11 2005, November 12th 2005 or November 5th 2012.
I think in some countries there’s one commonly used standard but of course here in Canada, once again we’re a mix of British and US conventions.
Quite a few years ago I started using the 2012-12-09 standard mostly because it would sort automatically on computers. Also the four digit year was unambiguous. Works well.
It’s no surprise that Y would volunteer. It’s a lot of fun helping others. If you haven’t volunteered for something, perhaps you should give it a try. You might find you like it!
I agree 100%, i volunteer at a local non-profit bike shop in my town and it’s a lot of fun. i mean you can volunteer at senior centers, humane society’s, bike shops, etc…
i’ve done the same at a non-profit bike shop in philly and it is loads of fun. Unfortunately I’m no longer close enough to continue right now…..miss it.
I’m glad Rick started tweeting links to posted comics again today, yay! I’m sad because as I caught up on all the strips I forgot to read without a Twitter reminder link, I found the note about how there’s less than a month left before the next hiatus in the strip. Enjoy your time off Rick & Brian, but remember to tweet it out when you return!
It’s great that Yehuda is going to volunteer at a soup kitchen but I think it is important to remember that soup kitchens as well as a lot of non-profits need volunteers year-round not just the holidays. Cheers!
One person volunteering is great, but when you can get together with like minded people, you can leverage each other’s skills and talents and change the world, (or at least your corner of it).
Now if more people would do that! It probably would do Joe some good to help Yehuda at the soup kitchen.
Now if only there was no need for soup kitchens …
That would be true progress.
I get a little thrill that I can read a 12/10 comic when it’s still 12/9 on the west coast.
@Michael – (Tongue in cheek) – So why isn’t it called ’11/9′ ?
Sorry – couldn’t resist. No offence intended to those who suffer/ed…
I’m confused. I think there is some mixup over UK and US nomenclature. mm/dd/yyyy or dd/mm/yyyy.
I never understood would you’d put the month first. Either the largest increment, years, or the smallest, days, but month should always be in the middle. I find that receipts I have to file by month never seem to follow any set convention from one store to the next. I’m always cross referencing and guessing if the day is less than the 12th of the month. I personally created a lovely six character date code that I’d love to see the world adopt. It’s very clear and simple. Today would be 10DE12 See? Simple! Just add letters.
I like your code, Yolanda. I think we in the US notate date that way because that’s how we use it in conversation. If you asked me the date I would say it’s December 10th, whereas I think in your culture it’s more common to say it’s the 10th of December. Maybe that’s just me though?
How does your code differentiate between March and May and between June and July?
Usually I agree with you Yolanda, but today I have to disagree.
As a Dyslexic I find numbers relatively easy to use and remember, but letters confuse me and names impossible.
When playing games on the computer I need to save the current game before going into unpredictable/unknown territory and I use the following convention to name the save:
1. day of month
2. month
3. year
4. hour
5. minute
So this instant would be 101212_1754
I recently discovered that my Wife uses the same system when saving files at work as a computer programmer…
Of course if you want even more granularity, you could add the seconds. (I tend to use digital timepieces a lot and have a lot of ‘Atomic’ clocks. My wristwatch is a Casio ‘Wave Ceptor’ that updates it’s crystal clock with the strongest radio timepiece signal from the world-standard clocks.
ISO 8601 sets a very usable standard for date formats that makes it easier for both humans and computers to use. It goes from biggest to smallest (e.g. 2012-12-10 13:14) which is unambiguous and allows files to be sorted easily by computers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601
For Chris — March would be MR and May is MY; January is JA, June is JE, and July is JL; and April = AP and August = AG. For months like February, September, October, November, and December, where this is no other month starting with the same letter, the first two letter will work, although a single letter could also suffice
Yolanda, regarding your new calendar: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29BoqCMRBFk
Yeah, that bugs me too. The inconsistency especially when it’s before the 13th of a month. You don’t know if 12/11/05 is December 11 2005, November 12th 2005 or November 5th 2012.
I think in some countries there’s one commonly used standard but of course here in Canada, once again we’re a mix of British and US conventions.
Quite a few years ago I started using the 2012-12-09 standard mostly because it would sort automatically on computers. Also the four digit year was unambiguous. Works well.
There is a reason military format for date is 12 Dec 2012….no confusion
It’s no surprise that Y would volunteer. It’s a lot of fun helping others. If you haven’t volunteered for something, perhaps you should give it a try. You might find you like it!
Like
I agree 100%, i volunteer at a local non-profit bike shop in my town and it’s a lot of fun. i mean you can volunteer at senior centers, humane society’s, bike shops, etc…
i’ve done the same at a non-profit bike shop in philly and it is loads of fun. Unfortunately I’m no longer close enough to continue right now…..miss it.
friends with benefits are nice too…
Good on ya, Yehuda!
I’m glad Rick started tweeting links to posted comics again today, yay! I’m sad because as I caught up on all the strips I forgot to read without a Twitter reminder link, I found the note about how there’s less than a month left before the next hiatus in the strip.
Enjoy your time off Rick & Brian, but remember to tweet it out when you return!
It’s great that Yehuda is going to volunteer at a soup kitchen but I think it is important to remember that soup kitchens as well as a lot of non-profits need volunteers year-round not just the holidays. Cheers!
One person volunteering is great, but when you can get together with like minded people, you can leverage each other’s skills and talents and change the world, (or at least your corner of it).