Date and time notation

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.

  • RFC 822 "Standard for the Format of Arpa Internet Text Messages"
    • published 1982-08-13
    • e.g. used for email
    • format: [day ,] 20 Jun 82 14:01:17
  • RFC 2445 "Internet Calendaring and Scheduling Core Object Specification"
    • format: 19960401T235959Z
  • RFC 3339 "Date and Time on the Internet: Timestamps"
    • published July 2002
    • intended use: new internet protocols
    • format: 1982-06-20
  • W3C: "Use international date format (ISO)"

See also[edit]