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Suggestion
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Resolution: Unresolved
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None
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Linux Server
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10
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4
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NOTE: This suggestion is for Confluence Cloud. Using Confluence Server? See the corresponding suggestion.
It would be incredibly useful if the date format of the Date Lozenge could be customized. Currently, it looks like the only way to display the date is the dd-mm-yyyy format. This causes problems when attempting to sort Date Lozenges that display in either a table or in a Page Properties Report macro. It sorts the day then the month then the year. Thus we end up with:
16 Sept 2014
17 Aug 2014
18 January 2013
I realize most of the world does put dates in the logical order (dd-mm-yyyy), but the US is behind on this unique concept, so I often have people asking me if the date can be changed or if they can put the date in as mm-dd-yyyy instead.
I see two ways of fixing this:
- Allow Confluence admins to specify the date format the Date Lozenge and allow users to enter the date as mm-dd-yyyy.
- Correct the sorting of the Date Lozenge in the dd-mm-yyyy format so it sorts correctly by Year, Month, then Day in tables and the Page Properties Macro.
- is duplicated by
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- Closed
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- Closed
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- Closed
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- Closed
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- Closed
- is related to
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- Gathering Interest
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[CONFCLOUD-35168] Date Lozenge Date Format and Sorting
does not work for german users --> date picker widget is not translated AT ALL and has Sunday as leftmost day (week starts with MONDAYS in Germany)
Wow, this is an issue in the cloud version as well. Why would someone use a date lozenge if you can't specify their formatting?
Bringing in Confluence to a new team is always a mixed blessing. ITs great to change the default dates to ISO-8601 for everything accept the date lozenge.
Sigh.
6 years open ticket/suggestion to bring data to ISO display format.
Needs to use ISO 8601 by default (thank you Mark A. Ziesemer for the XKCD reference too). It should also be configurable. However, ISO 8601 would make table sorting MUCH easier!
MarkZ
added a comment - 2 concerns:
- Regardless of the date format configured or entered, dates need to sort properly.
- I have both the "Formatting and International Settings" in the Confluence administration, as well as my workspace regional settings (Windows 10) set to ISO 8601 format (yyyy-MM-dd). As @Sylvain noted, the Date Lozenge still displays it the way it wants: dd-MM-yyyy. (Tested with all of Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Firefox. Confluence 5.9.1)
So sorry, @George - while using a built-in OS function here from an individual's workstation setting would be ideal, it currently isn't applying, and a fix for this is urgently required.
I recently entered a new large organization, and am hoping to introduce Confluence here after having used it for several years previously with much success - but trivial issues like this that have already been open for over a year and will probably remain unresolved for another few years are very discouraging, and will become a factor (along with several other similar types of issues) during our evaluation.
If a non-configurable date format is going to be used here, at least make it a standard that can and will work for all of the needs here (including sorting). Even as an American, I agree that MM-dd-yyyy is not logical. dd-MM-yyyy is better, but backwards - and still wouldn't resolve a lexicographical sorting example.
There are a number of advantages to using the ISO 8601 format:
- International standard. Language- and context-independent.
- Unambiguous. As different countries has different conventions, a date such as 01-04-2011 may be interpreted as either January 4 (MM-DD-YYYY) or April 1 (DD-MM-YYYY). ISO 8601 eliminates this ambiguity.
- Provides for proper sorting. As date and time values are organized from the most to the least significant, the lexicographical order of the representation thus corresponds to chronological order. This allows dates to be naturally sorted by, for example, file systems.
- Would fix the sorting issue here.
- Scalable. The format doesn't need to change with varying precisions.
- Is the standard used by a number of other standards and technologies, including XML and other W3C standards.
(Obligatory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601)
I don't disagree - the date format here should be configurable. But if a "static" format is needed here, ISO-8601 is the best bet.
For short-term, is there any way to tweak this - even if through editing a property file outside of the Confluence Administration UI? JIRA has https://confluence.atlassian.com/jira/changing-the-due-date-input-format-192536.html, for example, for a similar situation - but it doesn't appear to apply here.
MarkZ
added a comment - 2 concerns:
Regardless of the date format configured or entered, dates need to sort properly.
I have both the "Formatting and International Settings" in the Confluence administration, as well as my workspace regional settings (Windows 10) set to ISO 8601 format ( yyyy-MM-dd ). As @Sylvain noted, the Date Lozenge still displays it the way it wants: dd-MM-yyyy . (Tested with all of Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Firefox. Confluence 5.9.1)
So sorry, @George - while using a built-in OS function here from an individual's workstation setting would be ideal, it currently isn't applying, and a fix for this is urgently required.
I recently entered a new large organization, and am hoping to introduce Confluence here after having used it for several years previously with much success - but trivial issues like this that have already been open for over a year and will probably remain unresolved for another few years are very discouraging, and will become a factor (along with several other similar types of issues) during our evaluation.
If a non-configurable date format is going to be used here, at least make it a standard that can and will work for all of the needs here (including sorting). Even as an American, I agree that MM-dd-yyyy is not logical. dd-MM-yyyy is better, but backwards - and still wouldn't resolve a lexicographical sorting example.
( http://xkcd.com/1179/ )
There are a number of advantages to using the ISO 8601 format:
International standard. Language- and context-independent.
Unambiguous. As different countries has different conventions, a date such as 01-04-2011 may be interpreted as either January 4 (MM-DD-YYYY) or April 1 (DD-MM-YYYY). ISO 8601 eliminates this ambiguity.
Provides for proper sorting. As date and time values are organized from the most to the least significant, the lexicographical order of the representation thus corresponds to chronological order. This allows dates to be naturally sorted by, for example, file systems.
Would fix the sorting issue here.
Scalable. The format doesn't need to change with varying precisions.
Is the standard used by a number of other standards and technologies, including XML and other W3C standards.
(Obligatory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601 )
I don't disagree - the date format here should be configurable. But if a "static" format is needed here, ISO-8601 is the best bet.
For short-term, is there any way to tweak this - even if through editing a property file outside of the Confluence Administration UI? JIRA has https://confluence.atlassian.com/jira/changing-the-due-date-input-format-192536.html , for example, for a similar situation - but it doesn't appear to apply here. Sylvain's suggestion will not work for global teams, who span across different date formats? That is why date format is usually read from the individual's workstation settings, not some global product configuration. In fact, using the built-in OS function does that and is much easier because it also does conversions....
The server version (and the legacy editor after migrating to the cloud) formatted the date differently depending on the current locale which was nice, but it didn't sort correctly in tables. The cloud version is the opposite: it sorts correctly but the formatting is fixed to MMM d, YYYY (e.g. Mar 14, 2024). The month string is in English regardless of the locale you have set. At least it is in an unambiguous format, but it would be better to allow each user to set their desired format (which would ideally be done in the OS settings).