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Placid

Americans And Their Dates

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You lucky lucky people; the date format generally used in the code I deal with has the form:

DDHHMM MON YY Z

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Yeh...Americans just don't want to change to easier formats and measurement systems that make more sense than the current ones. But the "colour/color armour/armor" thing... well, it's pronounced without the u...

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Color, armor, etc are shorter. More efficient. No unnecessary letters. I like the metric system more, but if I started using it all the time, no one else would know WTH I was talking about. So until all the road signs change to metric, I guess I'm stuck with feet.

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same reason they can't spell colour right... they wanna be different (well, maybe colour is a laziness thing, dunno)

and now, after being different, they wonder why the rest of the world doesn't do the same as them :D

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Funny...I don't remember waking up and thinking "Hmm, I'd like to be different from the rest of the world, so I will make the U.S. date system different than everyone else!" I do not wonder why others do not follow us, I wonder who changed our system to be different from everyone else.

 

Lazy wud b typing like dis so dat no1 but teh 1337 ppl can reed wat i say. Sue me for following the current spelling conventions of my country. I did not really have a choice in where I was born. :)

Edited by Tanyia

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your all dirty commies go back to russia <_<... wait the red scare is over... i guess americans like to be different. stupid americans stole the land from the native americans... stupid bill gates controls the weather

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your all dirty commies go back to russia <_<... wait the red scare is over...

167230[/snapback]

 

No, it's not... You don't watch the news too much, do you... ;)

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Funny...I don't remember waking up and thinking "Hmm, I'd like to be different from the rest of the world

...

I wonder who changed our system to be different from everyone else. 

well, I don't mean the current generation for that, of course.

Though in the case of metric system, it's more that they didn't change when the rest of the world did (and really... our numbers are base 10, why should measurements be base 3, 12, 16, etc all at once?)

I do not wonder why others do not follow us

some do. or just use what they're used to and just assume/expect the rest of the world to be the same. I've encountered that a few times.

Lazy wud b typing like dis so dat no1 but teh 1337 ppl can reed wat i say.

well, that's more of a jr teenager issue than location. oh, and eww!

Sue me for following the current spelling conventions of my country.  I did not really have a choice in where I was born. ;)

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heh, you can always use the international version (I do, australian date format is dd/mm/yyyy, I use yyyy-mm-dd)

but no, I don't blame people who fllow what's common around them, just those who want to be different (including `l33t'-speak)

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Curiously, the system of measurements in the US are defined in terms of the metric system -- its just that they have never got around to adopting the decimal system.

 

See this page on the metric system in the USA.

 

(OK, admitted deviation from the original date format topic, but had been mentioned above)

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placid, almost every language has functions to create *NIX style timestamps (long numbers that are just a count of time that elapsed since the first of january 1970 at 00:00)

 

 

almost every programming language also have functions to turn these timestamps into any desired format of date (there are several) be it dd/mm/yyyy or yy/dd/mm.. or anything you dream :)

 

 

instead of using the (usually limited) DATE and TIME sql basic types (be it on M$sql or mysql or postgresql or oracle.. etc etc) i usually justdeclare my time variables as numbers and make use of the *NIX time generators and functions to decode it :)

 

im pretty shure java has it somewhere ;)

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:lapses into lecture mode: actually the reasons behind the differences in date formats are quite simple. its a matter of languages...most of the world(and places that are/were heavily influenced by the areas that do....down with empires!) pronounce it as day/month/year (americans, think "cinco de mayo") while americans prouncounce it as month/day/year (eg may 5th) they originally DID use the same system as the rest of the world, but it has slowly changed over the years (1 reason y americans still use 4th of July). y it has changed is a matter of debate, with arguments ranging from a deliberate alteration just to be obtuse (which i consider ridiculous) to more moderate ideas such as natural linguistic evolution (far more likely in my opinion).

 

:slips outta lecture mode and looks @ what he wrote: sheesh, i sometimes feel like will ferrel in Old School...sry bout tthat, thats the offical word i was given when the same question was asked in my world civ class in college...the stuff in parenthesis is pure me....there were lots of references that i cant be bothered to remember :blink::blink::ph34r:

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Well, Placid, in a way I agree with you, and in another way I don't. Americans have their flaws, and its probably because of foolish pride, but what separates them from the rest of the world? I am sure if you dug through every culture, eventually you will find something annoying like this in all of them. Yes, Bill Gates is ebul, no arguments there. But just because you get annoyed by it, doesn't mean it's gonna change, especially if all you do is come rant at an online game forum. ;) Sure, it might have been better to do it like the rest of the world, but it's not like computers existed when Americans started using a date system, and its not like its ever gonna change. Sure, it may be an inconvenience to SOME people, but its a small inconvenience to get so mad over. Compare it to the inconveniences other people have, like making ends meet, yada yada yada. Take it from me, I was born in Africa, and lived there for 4 years, and I have seen true inconveniences. :P There are always going to be differences in the world, and the way some country writes their date is nothing. It's not like people all over the place start saying damn Russians, why don't they speak the same language as me. Damn Chinese, why don't they eat the same food as me. or. Damn English, why don't they drive on the same side of the car as me. Think about it, really, doesn't it seem kind of selfish to get all pissed off because of one tiny little thing that didn't happen just the way you like it? If so, then what's left of your life is gonna be a big dissapointment.

 

-Kinger

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On behalf of america, we're sorry you guys do everything backwards. God...can you foreign-types get any morescrewed up?

 

 

 

 

Now...remind me again...how the hell do people in australia keep from falling off of the planet?!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In all seriousness, I doubt any of you want me to slip into my whole "Everything in the world is a matter of perception...what makes 'good'? what makes 'evil'? how do we define large [physical trait, i.e. breasts] as 'attractive,' while having a large [more obscure physical trait, i.e. nose] as 'unattractive'..." i think you get the idea...

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Placid 

post Jun 3 2005, 06:57 AM

Why can't Microsoft and the rest of the USA use DD/MM/YYYY or even DD/MON/YYYY?

 

 

I didnt take the time to read the whole thread and I stopped at the post I quoted. The United States military has used DD/MM/YYYY (and DD/MON/YYYY)for more than 50 years. So, I guess its not the Americans you have a complaint with, just the software compainies that dominate the planet.

 

*EDIT* ack Ive read more of the topic and I see my point was already made.

 

But in all fairness since Internet was invented in United States Universities then I guess they had the first say in how the dating system was and everyone that didnt follow them was actually breaking off the beaten path and comming up with their own system.

Edited by jimmythesaint

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placid, almost every language has functions to create *NIX style timestamps (long numbers that are just a count of time that elapsed since the first of january 1970 at 00:00)

almost every programming language also have functions to turn these timestamps into any desired format of date (there are several) be it dd/mm/yyyy or yy/dd/mm.. or anything you dream :D

instead of using the (usually limited) DATE and TIME sql basic types (be it on M$sql or mysql or postgresql or oracle.. etc etc)  i usually justdeclare my time variables as numbers and make use of the *NIX time generators and functions to decode it :(

 

im pretty shure java has it somewhere :rolleyes:

170528[/snapback]

Errr, im not stupid :) I know that, my point was merely a gripe at M$ and the American date format :)

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But in all fairness since Internet was invented in United States Universities then I guess they had the first say in how the dating system was and everyone that didnt follow them was actually breaking off the beaten path and comming up with their own system.

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nah, that doesn't track. they used something that already exists (date format), just bringing it to a new place doesn't mean that everyone else then becomes wrong.

otherwise:

the photocopier was developed starting in australia then in japan. anything photocopied(or xeroxed for those so stupid they verb locally common nouns <_< ) needs to have the dates in the internationally accepted format. anyone photocopying something with american format dates is "actually breaking off the beaten path and comming up with their own system."

 

:(

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