Short Date format varies

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My PC has Access2003 SP2 - new application I made has a Table's Time/Date
data type where the Short Date format is exampled as 6/18/1994 (in the pull
down where it shows the examples of the various date formats..). And it
shows this way thru out all Forms/Reports, etc. Everything is fine.

I put the application on another's desktop, also with Access2003 SP2 and
noticed the field is showing 18.Jun.07 in various Forms/Reports. I looked at
the table's Time/Date data type and on this PC the Short Date format is
exampled as 18.Jun.94.

It is different than mine - and more or less identical to Medium Date except
that there are . separators rather than - separators.

Have never seen this before. The user wants numbers only - - but I would
just like a better understanding of what controls this variance.....
welcoming any advice...
 
It'scontrolled by the version of Windows the PC is running! I'm still running
Windows 98SE and my Short Date uses the 2 digit designation for the year.
Subsequent versions of Windows use the 4 digit designation. I'm not sure
exactly which version of Windows this occured in.
 
Forgot to add, you should be able to display the dates any way you want using
Format(), regardless of how it's stored in your table.

--
There's ALWAYS more than one way to skin a cat!

Answers/posts based on Access 2000

Message posted via AccessMonster.com
 
NetworkTrade said:
My PC has Access2003 SP2 - new application I made has a Table's
Time/Date data type where the Short Date format is exampled as
6/18/1994 (in the pull down where it shows the examples of the
various date formats..). And it shows this way thru out all
Forms/Reports, etc. Everything is fine.

I put the application on another's desktop, also with Access2003 SP2
and noticed the field is showing 18.Jun.07 in various Forms/Reports.
I looked at the table's Time/Date data type and on this PC the Short
Date format is exampled as 18.Jun.94.

It is different than mine - and more or less identical to Medium Date
except that there are . separators rather than - separators.

Have never seen this before. The user wants numbers only - - but I
would just like a better understanding of what controls this
variance..... welcoming any advice...
Click to expand...

The *named* formats "short date", "medium date", etc., are controlled by the
regional settings in Windows Control Panel. To avoid that use explicit format
strings like "mm/dd/yyyy". Those will display the same on all computers.
 
guess I will have to refresh the Format() method.....can't remember the
details off hand....

It just surprises me that in two Versions of Access2003 that one's Short
Date format is 6/19/1994 and the other is 19.Jun.94

I can, kind of, see it being due to the OS - - - but not really thinking it
should - - - I would think that Access would suppress/normalize variations in
OS date format rather than pass them forward with variations from the OS.
Now I kind of have to consider that when I design using a date format that
it's appearance will vary to other users and that doesn't seem good.......it
might mean I always have to hard code the precise Format.....or just live
with the variances....
 
The short date format is controlled by the regional settings (control
panel/regional settings/customize) of the PC. Access uses the Windows short
date setting by default or whenever you use the "Short Date" named format.
The PC's regional settings also control how currency is displayed and what
is used for the thousands separator. This is to eliminate having to
hard-code settings within the application to allow it to run in multiple
countries. For example, in Europe, the short date format is day/month/year.
This can be very confusing to Americans who are used to month/day/year and
vice versa. I'm working with a multi-national company now and so I'm using
dd-mmm-yyyy format which spells out the month abbreviation. This format is
understandable around the world and even the month names are converted when
you are running the app on a non-English version of the OS. Same thing goes
for currency. And, in some countries, the meaning of the comma and decimal
point are reversed - 111.234,45 rather than 111,234.45 as we are accustomed
to.

If you want to specifically control the date format in your app, you will
need to set the format property for each control that displays a date on all
your forms and reports.
 
yep - got the message. thnks
--
NTC


Rick Brandt said:
The *named* formats "short date", "medium date", etc., are controlled by the
regional settings in Windows Control Panel. To avoid that use explicit format
strings like "mm/dd/yyyy". Those will display the same on all computers.
Click to expand...
 
Forgot to add, you should be able to display the dates any way
you want using Format(), regardless of how it's stored in your
table.
Click to expand...
not quite correct, because n matter how it is formatted, it's
always stored the same way, that is the number of days since
December 30 1899 and the fraction of the day for hours and minutes.
 
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