Joda-time is an open source (Apache license) project for representing times... intended to do a better job than the java.util.Date and Calendar classes. Actually there is a current JSR for improving the date/time support in the JDK, headed up by the lead joda-time developer, but I digress.
I'm not sure if this project gives exactly what you need as I haven't had the need to use it in a while. I recall that they do have the concept of a Partial, which has only some but not all fields (such as year, date, month, hour, minute, second) specified. http://joda-time.sourceforge.net/ Jim > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Tuesday, May 29, 2007 3:22 AM > To: Derby Discussion > Subject: Library supporting variably determinate time > > I'm working on an application that will be storing family history > information. > > Some of the time data is precise and well known (my birthday), and some is > not. For example, a precise month and day may be known, but not > necessarily the precise year. > > Is anyone aware of any library or libraries that support the encoding of > temporal information with different levels of determinateness? > > Is anyone aware of any research into the representation and/or encoding of > such information? > > Thank you, > > Donald McLean
