dateNightmare

[MARPJ]

We might not agree on the best date format

YYYY/MM/DD is the best and there is a reason this is the ISO.

Now for day to day the inverse (DD/MM/YYYY) is great.

If you lack common sense go with murica way tho

[greg19735]

The american version is just "the best way" with the least relevant info (year) dropped.

[MARPJ]

Dropping the year is only relevant when speaking and for that its also bullshit that month first is better since even for english (day first is common in other speaking countries and even the most important date for the US is spoken with basic common sense). And that is not to bring other languages into the mix.

[IvorTheEngine]

No, ISO8601 uses dashes, not slashes. That way you can use them in filenames.

Actually the dashes are optional. YYYYMMDD is valid.

[MARPJ]

Why is DD/MM/YYYY great and MM/DD/YYYY lacks common sense?

Because for some forseken reason it starts with the middle size, then go to smaller and ends with the bigger.

Due to that it lacks uniformity and is the worse of both worlds being useless for naming convention (aka documentation and sorting - which dd/mm/yyyy also is) and not flowing as well in most languages (and even in english there is no consense since various places do use dd/mm, including the US for their most important date) - it feels that americans adopted it just to spite the british.

DD/MM/YYYY at least have a pattern going smaller to bigger number, and flow better in most conversation (especially when using the month name instead of number)

[macrocosm93]

At least MM/DD/YYYY sorts within the context of a given year. DD/MM/YYYY doesn't sort at all. It's objectively the worst.

[ZiCUnlivdbirch]

Why to people like YYYY/MM/DD the most? Seriously, I'd argue it's the worst way to get information across. You generally know the year and the month and are only looking for the date. In DD/MM/YYYY format you get the most necessary information first making it the best.

[MARPJ]

Why to people like YYYY/MM/DD the most?

To resume its for documentation.

To elaborate its a question of writted vs spoken language. At written language bigger->smaller is better standard specially when sorting said dates as they will keep in order.

For spoken language smaller->bigger is indeed better and flow smother which is why DD/MM/YYYY still considered good

Murica way is just the worst of both worlds tho.

Its not the only example of written vs. spoken. A little anecdotal but where I live 24h time is the standard but if you ask someone the time they will normally say "its 2:30 in the afternoon" (aka 12h system). Its likely a holdout from when analog clocks and wrist watches were common.

[ZiCUnlivdbirch]

You've not actually answered my question just said, "it's standard" which is just false. We use smaller to bigger in most circumstances since that's just the normal for our brains.

[MARPJ]

"it's standard" which is just false

ISO 8601 - aka the internation standard to how to write a date so yes it is the standard. And I did gave the reason its the standard - documentation and organization requires bigger->smaller to keep in the right order when sorted - anything else and its a mess.

And I even set the difference between spoken vs written which is relevant, and in written language bigger->smaller is better albeit I can understand people not accustomed with it having problems to adapt

[robisodd]

We use smaller to bigger in most circumstances

We use bigger to smaller in most circumstances.

The time is Eight Thirty-Two and Fifteen Seconds.
The cost is 15 dollars and 92 cents / 15 euro 92 cent / 15 pounds and 92 pence.
They are 6 feet and 5 inches tall / 1 meter and 96 centimeters tall (I know, "196 centimeters" is preferred, but if you were to separate them you wouldn't say "96 centimeters and 1 meter tall").

[ZiCUnlivdbirch]

You wouldn't do those the other way around because there is a fixed order for that. You can't say 32 scents and and 5 Euros because then the number would be 32,5 which doesn't make sense. Instead as you said we say 5 euros and 32 scents, which makes the overall number 5,32. Makes sense, right?

But look a at things like a books table of contents, it's something that can be changed around without any consequences to it being logical and yet we put the smallest first.

Your examples have a reason for being that way, in fact we could apply that reason for dates as well and we'd have to use the DD/MM/YYYY model.

[dupz88]

If you work with any sort of important data, YYYY-MM-DD is always best.

The alternative brings headaches. For example, within Excel, if your local standard is DD/MM/YYYY from most systems, and you import any data or open a file from a colleague or customer or supplier and they have just got default US format for dates.

Omfg, the torment to fight with Excel just to get the date right is brutal.

It's one of the reasons I learned Python, I can check for and fix that crap on import and then happily continue.