There is no danger of ambiguity provided the year is stated in full.  if
people start abbreviating like this, 01-JAN-01, then we are still no better
off.  There are many computer systems that have printed dates in this
format.  01-JAN-99 or 99-JAN-01 is usually not seen as ambiguous but until
2032 such a format is ambigous.  Hence YYYY should always stated.

Baron Carter

-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Wednesday, 14 February, 2001 13:19
To: U.S. Metric Association
Subject: [USMA:11007] Re: Fw: Well, damn it, NASA ought to be metr
[Yahoo! Clubs: Metric America]


Kilopascal wrote in USMA 11005:


>> Changing the numeric month to letters is wrong. Leave the standard as it
>is. Also, there is only one hyphen between the digits, not two.
>>
>> Today is 2001-02-14. Any problems understanding this?


Two days ago there was a problem about interpreting 01-02-12.  Was it
        Jan 2, 1912
        Feb 1, 1912
        Feb 12, 2001 ?

CAN/CSA-Z234,4-89, based on ISO 8601, on All-Numeric Dates and Times states:
Note:When the month is spelled out, any sequence is permissible because no
danger of ambiguity exists.  For example, neither 1 July nbor July 1 can be
misinterpreted."

Kilopascal favors purity even if it might be misunderstood.  What does he
think is the purpose of all-numeric dating?

Joseph B. Reid
17 Glebe Road West
Toronto    M5P 1C8                       Tel. 416 486-6071

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