eostrom@fiicmds04.tu-graz.ac.at (Erik Ostrom):
> So, suppose we allow for leaving out sections:
>
> <date at="1993">1993</date>
> <date at="Nov 1993">this month</date>
> <date at="1 Nov 1993">the first of November, 1993</date>
> <date at="1 Nov 1993 00:00:00">midnight</date>
>
> Length of field is enough to distinguish between these.
We _could_ avoid reinventing the wheel here: The ISO standard
ISO 8601:1991 "Data elements and interchange formats -
Information interchange - Representation of dates and times"
was designed to solve all the above (and other) problems.
Please take a look at it before you invent something else.
The full format for a time+date spec is aprox. as formely
exemplified:
1993-08-03T00:21:33+0200 (my time zone)
1993-08-02T22:21:33Z (UTC)
19930802T222133Z (UTC, shorter form)
I don't have the standard at hand now but can quote more from
it tomorrow if you are interested.
--- Peter Svanberg, NADA, KTH Email: psv@nada.kth.se Dept of Num Analysis and Comp. Science, Royal Institute of Technology Phone: +46 8 790 71 40 S-100 44 Stockholm, SWEDEN Fax: +46 8 790 09 30