| Pages in topic: [1 2] > | Poll: How do you generally write all-figure dates? Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
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This forum topic is for the discussion of the poll question "How do you generally write all-figure dates?".
This poll was originally submitted by Sheila Wilson. View the poll results »
| | | | | | | day - month - year | Apr 2, 2016 |
Obviously the Americans are still asleep ...
| | | | Sheila Wilson 
Spain
Local time: 09:17
Member (2007)
English
+ ...
| Clarification of intention | Apr 2, 2016 |
I don't remenber even suggesting this poll, but then I am "of a certain age" .
What isn't said, but was obviously intended, was that this refers to our own correspondence, invoices etc. In other situations, style guides, subject area constraints and client preferences may decide for us.
I for one have so many problems with the UK versus US format that I've taken to using the unambiguous YYYY-MM-DD format. ... See more I don't remenber even suggesting this poll, but then I am "of a certain age".
What isn't said, but was obviously intended, was that this refers to our own correspondence, invoices etc. In other situations, style guides, subject area constraints and client preferences may decide for us.
I for one have so many problems with the UK versus US format that I've taken to using the unambiguous YYYY-MM-DD format. It's invaluable for my trilingual invoices, where I aim to input the variable data just once and where ambiguity could be costly. But I don't see it used very often. ▲ Collapse
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| Day-month-year | Apr 2, 2016 |
Force of habit (me too I'm "of a certain age"), that's what I always write in my native language, though I'm aware that the Portuguese Norm (NP EN 28601) and the International Norm (ISO 8601) say differently (YYYY-MM-DD)...
| | | | Sheila Wilson
Spain
Local time: 09:17
Member (2007)
English
+ ...
| How about Spanish outside Spain? | Apr 2, 2016 |
Susana E. Cano Méndez wrote:
dd/mm/yyyy or dd/mm/yy
are two of the ways to express dates in Spanish.
I'm going on my first-ever long-haul holiday next month - to Mexico. Local websites, or at least their English versions, all seem to use the American format for dates. Maybe physical proximity overrides the rules made in Madrid? Or maybe they reverse them just for the tourist market, which seems to be largely American?
And then there are those Spanish native speakers who are able to write texts directly in English. They send them to me for polishing, knowing that I'll be expecting British English (their preference, apparently), and I find that all the dates have been reversed because "that's hos it's done in English"! 
| | | | | I avoid them! | Apr 2, 2016 |
I grew up with the dd mm yy(yy) model, but living in Scandinavia, it can be tricky.
Danes may write today's date as 2/4 2016 (2 April 2016), whic is clear enough.
I have been caught out by apparently illogical dates in Swedish - they sometimes use mm dd yy, and then it may be necessary to ask the client if I cannot find a date from the second half of the month that is unambiguous.
My default when there is space is 2 April 2016 if space allows.
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When translating into British English, I use the European date format - day-month-year. I'm occasionally asked to translate into American English (I have lived in the USA), in which case I use the American date format - month-day-year.
My own invoices and other documentation are dated according to the European format - day-month-year.
No-one has ever objected to this - yet ...
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Jessica Noyes
United States
Local time: 04:17
Member
Spanish to English
+ ...
| Year month day | Apr 2, 2016 |
I live my personal life on both sides of the US-Canada border, and maintain constant vigilance to adapt my spelling, punctuation, and date formats to the side I am on at that particular moment.
However, I changed the way I date (and name) my own work files not long ago, so that the chronological and numerical values are consistent: yyyymmddhh (h for hour due). The advantage of this is that even if the computer program is not aware that these are dates, it will order them properly every ti... See more I live my personal life on both sides of the US-Canada border, and maintain constant vigilance to adapt my spelling, punctuation, and date formats to the side I am on at that particular moment.
However, I changed the way I date (and name) my own work files not long ago, so that the chronological and numerical values are consistent: yyyymmddhh (h for hour due). The advantage of this is that even if the computer program is not aware that these are dates, it will order them properly every time. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Lingua 5B
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Local time: 10:17
Member (2009)
English to Croatian
+ ...
| To avoid confusion... | Apr 2, 2016 |
I write the Month in writing (not number), then the date as a number, and year as number:
eg. April 2, 2016.
This format is not ambiguous to anyone, while 04/02/2016 would mean February 4th in Europe (unlike USA).
| | | | Thayenga
Germany
Local time: 10:17
Member (2009)
English to German
+ ...
For the USA: mm/dd/yy. For all other countries: dd/mm/yy.
| | | | Mario Chavez (X)
Local time: 04:17
English to Spanish
+ ...
| American awake here! | Apr 2, 2016 |
Alexandra Speirs wrote:
Obviously the Americans are still asleep ...
The poll missed one possible option: Both.
I write my dates both ways.
American software designers, so full of math but so little aware of their surroundings, created that little devil of the Y2K virus, which turned out to be no virus but just sheer lack of competence about how the world at large writes years: it's always 1941, not '41. In 200 years hence, '41 could be 1941, 2041 or 2141.
Thank you for reading my coffee-fueled impromptu response.
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Mario Chavez (X)
Local time: 04:17
English to Spanish
+ ...
| In case of doubt, go for spelled-out dates | Apr 2, 2016 |
Christine Andersen wrote:
I grew up with the dd mm yy(yy) model, but living in Scandinavia, it can be tricky.
Danes may write today's date as 2/4 2016 (2 April 2016), whic is clear enough.
I have been caught out by apparently illogical dates in Swedish - they sometimes use mm dd yy, and then it may be necessary to ask the client if I cannot find a date from the second half of the month that is unambiguous.
My default when there is space is 2 April 2016 if space allows.
That's exactly what I do in my translations!
| | | | DLyons
Ireland
Local time: 09:17
Spanish to English
+ ...
| With Jessica on this | Apr 2, 2016 |
That way, the computer files are automatically ordered.
| | | | Rebecca Garber
Local time: 04:17
Member (2005)
German to English
+ ...
| According to the client's preference | Apr 2, 2016 |
Why would I choose any other format?
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