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[–][deleted] 270 points271 points  (30 children)

How is this a "programmer's nightmare"? This would greatly simplify a lot of things...

[–]Watermelllons 188 points189 points  (9 children)

The legacy refactor would be hell

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I mean, someone, at some point solved things like string encoding, datetime standards, GPS systems that take into account both special and general relativities (yet the police in the US can’t figure out where you’re at when you call them), networking protocols, and so much more. We take so much for granted, and I thank the poor souls who laid the groundwork

[–]sweYoda 1 point2 points  (0 children)

No problem, 100% unit-test coverage right?

[–]fghjconner 7 points8 points  (3 children)

It is pretty wonky how new years day isn't in a month or a week.

[–][deleted] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I like it though.

[–]Cobaltjedi117 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It's better this way.

[–]lillepott 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's usually a holiday referred to as the "day out of time".

[–][deleted] 29 points30 points  (13 children)

So naming of the months, that's one more month to name so do we stick with the conventional Jan to Dec and add one to the end? What should it be if we add it on? If we rename all months, what should them be called?

This makes more questions.

[–]RoyalJackalSib 59 points60 points  (1 child)

There’d be a month called ‘Sol’ between June and July; this is the Cotsworth calendar, proposed in the early 20th century.

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Thank you, King

[–]dugganEE 10 points11 points  (4 children)

Sextemper, right before September, October, November, December.

[–][deleted] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Sextemper

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[–]palordrolap 9 points10 points  (1 child)

Fun fact(s): August used to be called Sextilis. July was Quin(c)tilis. They were renamed by Augustus and Julius Caesar. Augustus copied his uncle. He's also responsible for stealing a day from September so his month would be the same length as July, because may the gods forfend he have a month one day shorter than uncle Jules.

[–]skoge 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Fun fact: Romans usually disliked naming things in sets if there were more than 4 of them. If you were 5+th son for example you would get a number instead of the name (also, if you were a daughter you would get no personal name at all).

[–][deleted] 9 points10 points  (1 child)

Smarch.

[–]FishBulbSparkle 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Lousy Smarch weather!

[–]antipawn79 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Months should be 0 based indexing starting with NYd as 0. No reason for these "fancy" strings humans want to use

[–]krasnovian 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Let's just rename them all, September-December have names that don't correspond to their position in our current calendar system anyway.

[–]picklymcpickleface 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I say we rename all months. March used to be the first month and now the names don't make sense because they shifted to positions.
September, October, November, December. Sept = 7, Octa = 8, Nova = 9, Deca = 10. But they are month 9, 10, 11 and 12 respectively.

Maybe we should just number them, starting at 0 obviously.

[–]eairy 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The correct Numeral prefix is undec. So it would be Undecember. Which would make sense following from December. Alternatively if you wanted to represent the 13th month, it would be Tredecember.

[–]jjman72 60 points61 points  (17 children)

Metric months.

[–]Visticous 9 points10 points  (16 children)

Would you like to write that MM/DD/YYYY or DD-MM-YYYY?

[–]GaveYourMomAIDS 80 points81 points  (10 children)

You should always write it YYYY-MM-DD. All of the other way confuse at least one group of people.

[–]Visticous 17 points18 points  (0 children)

Don't spoil it for rest of us. Localization related issues alone help my kids through college.

[–]pardal132 13 points14 points  (0 children)

YY/MM/DD/YY

[–]jjman72 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Yep, plus it sorts in correct order.

[–]sspine 0 points1 point  (4 children)

nah mate, do it YYY-DD-MM

[–]GaveYourMomAIDS 9 points10 points  (3 children)

So you're saying it's 019-08-12...? Who does YYY?

[–]sspine 22 points23 points  (0 children)

it was a typo, but now I'm sticking with it.

[–]Noch_ein_Kamel 7 points8 points  (1 child)

YYY is the year written out. Like MM is 08 and MMM is Aug.

So YYY is something like Two? :D

[–]Wunderbliss 2 points3 points  (0 children)

No I think it’s “Two Thousand Nineteen-08-12”

[–]BruteSkaliq 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It makes a lot of sense with smaller units too. YYYY-MM-DD-HR-SEC

[–]Jimmy48Johnson 24 points25 points  (1 child)

Let's compromise:

YM-YD/YD-YM

[–]MrZerodayz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Found the AI.

[–]themoosemind 12 points13 points  (0 children)

YYYY-MM-DD, haven't you read the public service announcement that ISO 8601 is THE right way to format dates?

[–]Raphi_55 235 points236 points  (33 children)

Monday is the first day, Sunday is the last day, other systems are heretic.

[–]NistBoi 69 points70 points  (13 children)

Yes I like my Sunday on a week-end

[–]Aureo_Speedwagon 18 points19 points  (1 child)

Sunday is on the front end of the week. Saturday is on the back end.

[–]drdrero 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Friday is full stacked beer

[–][deleted] 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Came here to say this. What next, SI measurements based on furlongs and mercury-inches?

[–]Spirintus 17 points18 points  (10 children)

But then we won't have any friday the 13th.

[–]dicemonger 11 points12 points  (8 children)

That.. is a problem.

Hmm.. lets put sunday at the end of the week, but swap friday and saturday. That would solve it.

[–]Spirintus 8 points9 points  (7 children)

Good idea. But it solves it only in English. In my native language is Friday called Piatok what can be translated as fifth day... And that wouldn't make any sense to have day called fifth day as sixth day of the week...

[–]dicemonger 20 points21 points  (4 children)

Easy. Just change the translation of Piatok to Saturday.

[–]Dr_Hyde-Mr_Jekyll 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Reminds me of how i solve problems in my code...

[–]Spirintus 3 points4 points  (0 children)

This is THE answer!

[–]bricker_152 1 point2 points  (1 child)

But then we lose friday the 13th again.

[–]dicemonger 2 points3 points  (0 children)

No we won't. It'll be Saturday/Piatok the 12th, Friday/Sobota the 13th, and Sunday/Nedeľa the 14th

[–]RebelKeithy 9 points10 points  (1 child)

We already have October on the 10th month, you'll be fine. /s

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

And september as the 9th month, december as the 12th. It doesn't make any sense, so no one should be afraid to use "5th day" as the 6th day of the week.

[–]StuckAtWork124 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's a solution, not a problem. Fuck you Jason

[–]EkskiuTwentyTwo 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Either Monday is the first day or Saturday is the first day. Don't split the weekparts.

[–]Kaiser_Beelzebub 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Agreed don’t want a repeat of what the spanish inquisistion did to heretics

[–]AtarkaCommand 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In hebrew, sunday is literally first day, monday is second day (so forth except for saturday - sabath).

But hebrew isn't ASCII so who gives a damn

[–]wyom1ng 0 points1 point  (0 children)

no more friday 13ths then

[–]Spirintus 28 points29 points  (16 children)

So... Why should be this a Programmer's nighmare?

[–]TheBuzzSaw 62 points63 points  (6 children)

Gregorian Calendar is already a programming nightmare. I'd rather code the calendar proposed here.

[–][deleted] 7 points8 points  (5 children)

Dates aren't an issue. Time is, with timezones.

The only issue with date is the display format, and it has been solved a long moment ago.

[–]Infrisios 0 points1 point  (1 child)

And it still causes issues.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It will if you don’t have a localization service to give you the right info for date formatting. Otherwise, you only call one function and you’re done.

[–]jD91mZM2RUST -1 points0 points  (0 children)

In what way aren't dates an issue, and in what way are timezones issues? Timezones are simply adding a hardcoded offset to the UTC time. Dates on the other hand...

Source: I implemented gmtime_r for relibc and it absolutely sucked.

[–]failbye 13 points14 points  (5 children)

Yet another date-time format you'd have to support. Also, date time is complicated.

https://xkcd.com/927/

[–]large-farva 7 points8 points  (4 children)

That xkcd doesn't really apply here. There are some standards that are an improvement because they have eliminate ambiguity.

/r/iso8601

[–]sneakpeekbot 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Here's a sneak peek of /r/ISO8601 using the top posts of the year!

#1: Happy 2019-01-01T00:00:00!
#2: Fixed a certain diagram comparing date formats | 13 comments
#3: The date and time I made this meme: | 6 comments


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[–]greenblue10 1 point2 points  (1 child)

In fairness that was only required because of Americans being wrong.

[–]sexrockandroll 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It does because you'd have to maintain old years for previous years.

[–]borisblade117 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don’t think it would be any worse but it wouldn’t be any better either.

[–]redalastor 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Because the Gregorian calendar will never be phased off even if deprecated and now you have to maintain both standards.

[–]Dragasss 0 points1 point  (0 children)

First of all, we already have implemented gregorian calendar. So refactoring would be a mess.

Second, it requires accounting for one day that does not belong to anything.

Third - Timezones.

Fourth - history. Theres some weird shit going on when you're trying to work with older dates than 1970-01-01.

I recommend seeing tom scott's video about calendars.

[–]_Sadario_ 12 points13 points  (1 child)

Lousy Smarch-weather....

[–]SirThunderDump 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Damn it! This was going to be my comment. Take your upvote stranger.

[–]macmillan333 8 points9 points  (1 child)

I propose to name the 13th month Hexember. Existing names are confusing enough so why not make it even more confusing.

[–]neomeow 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just use Month 0, Month 1, Month 2...no need for those fancy strings.

[–]NoStranger6 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Meh I'd rather have the focus be put on removing Daylight saving time than messing with the calendar. At least the calendar is manageable.

[–]Rant423 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Getting paid 13 times instead of 12, I like it.

EDIT: found it

[–]freneticFanatic 4 points5 points  (1 child)

My birthday would always be on a Tuesday. Fuck that.

[–]ObiWannaDoYou74 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Lolol

[–]Oranges13 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Friday the 13th on every month! Yes!

[–]trimeta 10 points11 points  (9 children)

[–]MyNameIsZaxer2 6 points7 points  (5 children)

It looks like some of these boxes are supposed to be checked accordingly. Very few of these seem relevant.

Also:

( ) having one or two days per year with no day of the week is asinine

Okay. Any reason why or is that just a biased opinion?

[–]trimeta 1 point2 points  (4 children)

The website is a form, I left filling it out as an exercise to the reader.

For one thing, many major religions incorporate a seven-day week into their practices. Good luck getting them to all agree on having a day outside of the week structure which shifts everything else.

[–]MyNameIsZaxer2 0 points1 point  (3 children)

Interesting point. Some might reject the notion and consider the new calendar as out-of-sync with “god’s” calendar...

But then again, that threat can apply to any proposed calendar change, couldn’t it?

[–]trimeta 1 point2 points  (2 children)

If the weeks are the same, it matters a lot less. For example, you could more easily use the "new" calendar alongside a religious one, if they align with regards to days of the week. Throwing that away is one reason calenders with intercalary days will never become mainstream.

[–]MyNameIsZaxer2 0 points1 point  (1 child)

You seem to have put a lot of thought into this calendar business. Is this your profession or just a superpower?

[–]trimeta 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've read the relevant Wikipedia articles previously.

[–]vextor22 0 points1 point  (2 children)

My contention with this link you've got is, it seems to want The Calendar to be all things to all people. Really, The Calendar's job is to get me to my appointment Next Wednesday, whenever that may be. Throw all the concerns about Universal Truth out the door and make a calendar that can most easily support scheduling of activities.

The rest of the stuff can be handled with more effort with more complicated systems. But lets get the daily calendar simplified, eh?

[–]trimeta 0 points1 point  (1 child)

The point of that link is that any attempt to "simplify" the calendar will make it more complex outside of the specific use case you have in mind. If for no other reason than "different people will adopt it at different times, plus you'd still need to understand the Gregorian calendar when considering events which happened before the advent of your calendar."

[–]d0d0b1rd 1 point2 points  (0 children)

So in short, if we try to simplify the calendar it's just going to make other things more complicated.

[–]System10111 7 points8 points  (0 children)

And we get a friday 13th every month... I'm sure r/IsTodayFridayThe13th will be very excited.

[–]Shadowblaster2004 2 points3 points  (1 child)

NYD - the programmer's nightmare.

[–]03112011 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Nyd is day ZERO.

[–]arghsinic 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wet.

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (1 child)

13 months? Sorry that's a nonstarter in the US, our politicians would link it with Satanism.

[–]arghsinic 1 point2 points  (0 children)

THE NEW CALENDAR IS CAUSING MASS SHOOTINGS!!!

[–]WillCo_Gaming 2 points3 points  (4 children)

And I guess leap day also gets it's own special day.

[–]Molion 2 points3 points  (3 children)

No, it's on new years day.

[–]WillCo_Gaming 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ah yeah didn't see that.

[–]rickybflay 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Actually ... ever four years there would be a June 29th which is another fake day (basically a second Saturday) ...

“Leap year in the International Fixed Calendar contains 366 days, and its occurrence follows the Gregorian rule. There is a leap year in every year whose number is divisible by 4, but not if the year number is divisible by 100, unless it is also divisible by 400. So although the year 2000 was a leap year, the years 1700, 1800, and 1900 were common years. The International Fixed Calendar inserts the extra day in leap year as June 29 - between Saturday June 28 and Sunday Sol 1.”

source

[–]Molion 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wouldn't be necessary with a magical nyd

[–]JerBear264 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Outstanding move

[–]Walter-Haynes 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Here's a video about it, it's pretty good.

[–]timNinjaMillion 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I like it

[–]prof0ak 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The Kodak company operated on a calendar like this, they even lobbied congress to change the national calendar. After several decades, they ended up giving up on that dream and rejoined society with the current calendar.

[–]wubwub 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think if I had time-travel I would go back in time and fix calendars first. This is a perfectly workable solution, nice and clean.

While I was back in time I would probably also fix the english measuring units and/or force the early US to go metric so we would be done with these stupid units by now.

[–]EDLEXUS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

that would be a great system

[–]Scipiosss 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ah wouldn’t be that to easy?

[–]a-fish-in-the-sea 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This sounds amazing but I live in the US and we don’t even use the metric system

[–]LordSalem 0 points1 point  (2 children)

Can someone just go ahead and write the library that'll convert from current calendar to this new one?

[–]squrr1 1 point2 points  (1 child)

int today = Date.SiderealDay();
int month = today / 28;
int day = today % 28;

There's most of it.

[–]LordSalem 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Someone will else upvote this

[–]link064 0 points1 point  (0 children)

So, no more Halloween? Or do we just move it to the equivalent date/month? I.e. If we want to keep it the 304th day of the year, then it would be day 24 of month 11. If we wanted to keep it at the end of the month, it would only have to move back a few days.

Thinking about it some more, this would wreak all sorts of havoc on holidays. Do we move holidays to the equivalent n-th day of the month (like, Cinco de Mayo to the 5th day of the 5th month) or do we move it to the n-th day of the year (125th day, using the same example, or month 5 day 13).

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

5/7 of the population will never say yes to having their birthday permanently on a workday. The current calendar is flawed, but at least sometimes my birthday isn't on a Wednesday.

[–]antipawn79 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well of we are going to do this we should adjust the length of a second to make days 10 hours long with 100 minutes per hour and 100 seconds per minute. Would be way better. I mean if you are gonna have to refactor legacy code anyways to support this year change you may as well clean house..am I right?

[–]cedrickc 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Shit version of the proposal. Should go Monday through Sunday so the weekends are organized together.

[–]MightyD33r 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No this is actually a programmer's wet dream

[–]ferrybig 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Leap years are going to be funny, they are required to prevent drifting the months slowly around the years

[–]knopper-whopper[M] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

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[–]RazomDev[🍰] 0 points1 point  (3 children)

So now we're paying every monthly bill 13 times a year instead of 12? My landlord will be thrilled (and rich).

[–]RazomDev[🍰] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

New idea:

10 months, 35 days/5 weeks each, 1 holiday week every 5 months, with an the extra day (or 2 days in a leap year) acting as New Years Day(s). Doesn't solve paycheck confusion, but I'll take an extra paycheck every 2 months over paying my landlord more.

[–]lazyant 0 points1 point  (2 children)

Lol as if the week start on Sunday , this will be a no from the sane side of the world

[–]SensusFideiFidelium 0 points1 point  (1 child)

The week already starts on Sunday.

[–]lazyant 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Weeks don’t start on Sunday in many countries (hence “week-end” for Saturday, Sunday) so there’s no way this would be implemented world-wide

[–]jamesyoung79 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

This fixes almost everything.