ISO 8601 usage
Encyclopedia
On the Internet
, the World Wide Web Consortium
(W3C) uses ISO 8601
in defining a profile of the standard that restricts the supported date and time formats to reduce the chance of error and the complexity of software.
RFC 3339 defines a profile of ISO 8601 for the use in Internet protocols
and standards
. It explicitly excludes durations and dates before the common era
. The more complex formats such as week numbers and ordinal days are not permitted.
ISO 8601 is referenced by several specifications, but the full range of options of ISO 8601 is not always used. For example, the various electronic program guide
standards for TV, digital radio, etc. use several forms to describe points in time and durations. The ID3
audio meta-data specification also makes use of a subset of ISO 8601.
The ISO 8601 week date, as of 2006, appeared in its basic form on major brand commercial packaging in the United States. Its appearance depended on the particular packaging, canning, or bottling plant more than any particular brand. The format is particularly useful for quality assurance, so that production errors can be readily traced to work weeks, and products can be correctly targeted for recall.
Implementation overview
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
, the World Wide Web Consortium
World Wide Web Consortium
The World Wide Web Consortium is the main international standards organization for the World Wide Web .Founded and headed by Tim Berners-Lee, the consortium is made up of member organizations which maintain full-time staff for the purpose of working together in the development of standards for the...
(W3C) uses ISO 8601
ISO 8601
ISO 8601 Data elements and interchange formats – Information interchange – Representation of dates and times is an international standard covering the exchange of date and time-related data. It was issued by the International Organization for Standardization and was first published in 1988...
in defining a profile of the standard that restricts the supported date and time formats to reduce the chance of error and the complexity of software.
RFC 3339 defines a profile of ISO 8601 for the use in Internet protocols
Internet protocol suite
The Internet protocol suite is the set of communications protocols used for the Internet and other similar networks. It is commonly known as TCP/IP from its most important protocols: Transmission Control Protocol and Internet Protocol , which were the first networking protocols defined in this...
and standards
Internet standard
In computer network engineering, an Internet Standard is a normative specification of a technology or methodology applicable to the Internet. Internet Standards are created and published by the Internet Engineering Task Force .-Overview:...
. It explicitly excludes durations and dates before the common era
Common Era
Common Era ,abbreviated as CE, is an alternative designation for the calendar era originally introduced by Dionysius Exiguus in the 6th century, traditionally identified with Anno Domini .Dates before the year 1 CE are indicated by the usage of BCE, short for Before the Common Era Common Era...
. The more complex formats such as week numbers and ordinal days are not permitted.
ISO 8601 is referenced by several specifications, but the full range of options of ISO 8601 is not always used. For example, the various electronic program guide
Electronic program guide
Electronic program guides and interactive program guides provide users of television, radio, and other media applications with continuously updated menus displaying broadcast programming or scheduling information for current and upcoming programming...
standards for TV, digital radio, etc. use several forms to describe points in time and durations. The ID3
ID3
ID3 is a metadata container most often used in conjunction with the MP3 audio file format. It allows information such as the title, artist, album, track number, and other information about the file to be stored in the file itself....
audio meta-data specification also makes use of a subset of ISO 8601.
The ISO 8601 week date, as of 2006, appeared in its basic form on major brand commercial packaging in the United States. Its appearance depended on the particular packaging, canning, or bottling plant more than any particular brand. The format is particularly useful for quality assurance, so that production errors can be readily traced to work weeks, and products can be correctly targeted for recall.
Related standards
European Norm: EN 28601:1992| Australia | AS 3802:1997 |
| Austria | OENORM EN 28601 |
| Belgium | NBN EN 28601 |
| Canada | CSA Z234.5:1989 |
| Czech Republic | CSN ISO 8601 |
| Denmark | DS/ISO 8601:2005 |
| Finland | SFS-EN 28601 |
| France | NF Z69-200; NF EN 28601:1993-06-01 |
| Germany | DIN ISO 8601:2006-09 (replaced DIN EN 28601:1993-02); related: DIN 5008:2011-04 |
| Greece | ELOT EN 28601 |
| Hungary | MSZ ISO 8601:2003 |
| Iceland | IST EN 28601:1992 |
| India | IS 7900:2001 |
| Ireland | IS/EN 28601:1993 |
| Italy | UNI EN 28601 |
| Japan | JIS X 0301-2002 |
| Lithuania | LST ISO 8601:1997 |
| Luxembourg | ITM-EN 28601 |
| México | NOM-008-SCFI-2002 |
| Netherlands | NEN ISO 8601 & NEN EN 28601 & NEN 2772 |
| Norway | NS-ISO 8601 |
| People's Republic of China | GB/T 7408-2005 |
| Poland | PN-90/N-01204 |
| Portugal | NP EN 28601 |
| Russia | ГОСТ ИСО 8601-2001 (current), ГОСТ 7.64-90 (obsolete) |
| South Africa | ARP 010:1989 |
| Spain | UNE EN 28601 |
| Sweden | SS-EN 28601 |
| Switzerland | SN ISO 8601:2005-08 |
| Thailand | TIS 1111:2535 in 1992 |
| UK | BS ISO 8601:2004, BS EN 28601 (1989-06-30) |
| US | ANSI INCITS 30-1997 (R2008) and NIST FIPS PUB 4-2 |
External links
- W3C
- Non-endorsed information
- Recommendations
- dateTime data type in XML Schema, which is based on a subset of ISO 8601
- Dates an Times in HTML Common microsyntaxes, intended to be a subset of ISO 8601
- QA Tips
- http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/iso-date (not followed by the W3C itself, which uses lots of different formats on their websites)
Implementation overview