Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers

It has been 2692 days since the outbreak
of the latest dispute over date formats.

Unofficial anagram of the Manual of Style

Multiple seasons in a date

How should a date that uses multiple seasons be entered? An issue of a certain journal ("Medieval Life," used on the Pioneer Helmet page) is dated "Autumn/Winter 1997/8." I've changed the years in the citation to "1997–98," but can't find a workaround for the seasons (e.g., "Autumn–Winter," "Autumn-Winter," or "Autumn/Winter") that doesn't tell me to "Check date values in: |date=." Thanks in advance for any suggestions! --Usernameunique (talk) 21:51, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Try Help_talk:Citation_Style_1. EEng 21:54, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! Asked there. --Usernameunique (talk) 22:54, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

If you resolve it there could you ping us here? Possibly this page should be updated. EEng 23:22, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Maybe this page should be updated, but I don't think this page should go into formatting dates within citations, only date format in general. Date formats purely within citations would be discussed at WP:Citing sources or, if and only if the article uses Citation Style 1 or 2, Help_talk:Citation_Style_1. Jc3s5h (talk) 23:50, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

I said "maybe". EEng 02:11, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

Here's the answer: Help_talk:Citation_Style_1/Archive_31#Multiple_years_and_seasons_in_a_date. Essentially, MOS does not contemplate such a date, and thus citation styles 1&2 don't support it. "Autumn–Winter 1997" was suggested as "sufficiently correct enough" to avoid confusion. --Usernameunique (talk) 18:32, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

I took the liberty of updating Usernameunique's wikilink to account for archiving. If I happened to know that an organization's autumn-winter season runs from November 30 to March 20, and that nearly all of the activity begins in January, and I saw "Autumn-Winter 1997" applying to this organization, I would wonder what year is meant by "Autumn–Winter 1997". I don't think it's an acceptable solution, whether for an organization's season or for a journal. —Anomalocaris (talk) 17:34, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Unit conversions : giving both equally

In aircraft articles, specifications are given in metric and imperial. Template:convert is often used between units, but can imply errors by rounding when it shouldn't, when conversion are made backwards, with the wrong source unit. The best thing to do is to retain the manufacturer specs, as in Airbus_A330neo#Specifications where the template isn't called but the manufacturer conversions are used, with its deliberate rounding. To avoid confusing it with the output of Template:convert, I separate units with a slash instead of giving one or the other inside brackets, I don't even know which is preferred : obviously Airbus engineering works in metric, but its marketing is often in imperial units as it is customary. Do you think this agnosticism, not choosing a preferred unit and showing it, can be useful for the reader? --Marc Lacoste (talk) 14:01, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

I agree that using the source's conversion precision is best, but I don't see any reason to display these conversions differently from the way the template would. The general reader doesn't care who did the conversion, and precision geeks can check the page source if they care. Kendall-K1 (talk) 14:22, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

Agree with Kendall, plus maybe we should add "WARNING: DO NOT USE WIKIPEDIA TO BUILD AN AIRPLANE" to WP:General_disclaimer. EEng 14:33, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

why assuming the general reader is dumb? It isn't precision geekery, I'm perfectly fine with appropriate rounding, but aircraft are certificated to hard limits and badly interpreted rounding can deteriorate over multiple conversions. This info isn't intended to build an airplane but to understand its capabilities. --Marc Lacoste (talk) 16:31, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

<rolls eyes> [1] [2] EEng 16:48, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

If you can't express yourself as you want, blame you, not your reader.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 21:28, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

I expressed myself as I wanted, but unfortunately overestimated the sophistication of my audience. EEng 21:36, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

You seem nice.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 19:46, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

Julian and Gregorian calendars and Days of the Year articles

I posted this 19 February 2014 and it was archived 12 March 2014 without generating any useful discussion, but it remains an issue.

In section Julian and Gregorian calendars it says, "Dates of events in countries using the Gregorian calendar are given in the Gregorian calendar." For example, Greece did not adopt the Gregorian calendar until 1923, so events in Greece prior to 1923 are supposed to be given with the Julian date. Presumably this rule applies generally, but it does not specifically state that this rule applies in Days of the Year articles. A reader looking at a Days of the Year article (e.g. January 1) would assume that two events or births in the same year both happened the same day. This would suggest that all events, births, and deaths in Days of the Year articles should be in the Gregorian calendar starting in 1582. The downside of this would be that articles about people and events relating to countries that adopted the Gregorian calendar after 1582 would have different dates from the Days of the Year article. This could be confusing!

I think WP:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers#Julian and Gregorian calendars should be modified to clarify the application of "Dates of events in countries using the Gregorian calendar are given in the Gregorian calendar" to Days of the Year articles. Whichever way the decision goes, I would suggest that events, births and deaths after 1582 in countries that still used the Julian Calendar should have clarifications in Days of the Year articles. For example, Ioannis Kapodistrias (11 February 1776 – 9 October 1831) is listed in February 11 as

• 1776 – Ioannis Kapodistrias, Greek politician, 1st Governor of Greece (d. 1831)

His Gregorian birthday is February 22, 1776. So if it is ruled that the use of Gregorian dates goes by country in Days of the Year articles, I would modify his listing in February 11 to something like

• 1776 – Ioannis Kapodistrias (Gregorian birthday February 22), Greek politician, 1st Governor of Greece (d. 1831)

And if it is ruled that Days of the Year articles list Gregorian dates starting in 1582, I would suggest listing Ioannis Kapodistrias in February 22 something like

• 1776 – Ioannis Kapodistrias (Julian birthday February 11), Greek politician, 1st Governor of Greece (d. 1831)

—Anomalocaris (talk) 16:17, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

"Months and Years" style guide is blatantly wrong

The style guide states the following rule: “A comma follows the year unless followed by other punctuation”. It then provides the following sentence as an example:

The weather on March 12, 2005, was clear and warm

This sentence actually demonstrates that the rule is wrong (quite apart from the fact that the official style guide cannot even punctuate its own examples correctly with a final period). Remove the date from the sentence, and one is left with:

The weather, was clear and warm

The comma within the date (12,) is part of the date format, whereas the comma following the date (2015,) is part of the sentence structure, not part of the date. So removing the date from the sentence leaves us with a misplaced comma. The other way of trying to explain this concept is to reverse the above. A date is formatted thus:

March 12, 2015

Now create a sentence:

The weather was clear and warm.

Now add the date to that sentence:

The weather on March 12, 2015 was clear and warm.

Finally, the best way to avoid this issue altogether is to refrain from interrupting the natural flow of the sentence in the first place simply by writing the sentence thus:

The weather was clear and warm on March 12, 2015.

Therefore, I urge that we remove the above incorrect rule from the style guide altogether.

—Dilidor (talk) 18:18, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Other style guides, such as the Chicago Manual of Style, endorse the comma before and after the year. I suppose the rational is that the year is extra information that often isn't provided, so the extra information is set off with commas. Jc3s5h (talk) 18:46, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

I find Dilidor's logic quite compelling. An alternative illustration of the same point is to write "The weather on 12 March 2015 was clear and warm". Do away with the pesky comma. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 19:21, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

I find his logic absurd. Why did he remove only one comma of the pair offsetting the year? Crazy. Your version with zero commas is OK, too, but unbalanced commas, not. Dicklyon (talk) 04:26, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

• As it happens, this was the subject of one of my better-known parodies, User:EEng#Why_every_goddam_thing_needn.27t_be_micromanaged_in_a_rule. Personally I think the comma should be optional, and no, not with uniformity within an article, just left to the judgment of editors. (Most uses of commas have more to do with sentence cadence than with "correctness" or even clarity. Serial commas are a great example of that.) However, the place this would have to be worked out is over at the main MOS page – see MOS:COMMA – and I'll tell you now you'll get some still resistance from people who think the year is a "parenthetical" or "appositive", and therefore must be "set off with commas". But I'd encourage you to get such a discussion started. As you'll see in my parody linked above, I think this is one of the sillier rules. (Paging Herostratus and Tony1, whose opinions might be interesting here.) EEng 02:01, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Your next parody should address the logical gymnastics necessary to conclude that a style guide is "blatantly wrong". But I'll add to your warning to the OP; at the MOS main page you may well find editors who believe in the value of having a stable MOS and are willing to sacrifice some of their favourite and "obviously correct" third-grade grammar lessons in order to have some consistency in article style. Primergrey (talk) 03:25, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Primergrey: "… the logical gymnastics necessary to conclude that a style guide is 'blatantly wrong'." Ok, my wording there may have been a bit fired-up—inflammatory, even. I was mostly miffed at other editors who engage in revert wars over commas, all the while citing the style guide as the inflexible law. It is, after all, a guide, not The Holy Style Bible. Perhaps the style guide should contain disclaimers on every page warning editors that it is to be considered just that—a guide—and not to be invoked as Rule of Law on Wikipedia. Regardless, I will consider opening this can of worms on the main style page. —Dilidor (talk) 10:54, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

@Dilidor: Let me point out that it was my addition of commas to Stamp Act 1765 that got you started on this crusade, and also let me point out that you reverted my edit, not the other way around. So if I am the one who got you miffed, it is not for the reason you state, but that my edits are not to your taste, even though they conform to Chicago Manual of Style and Wikipedia's MoS. Besides the two dates where I added the comma after the year, there were seven cases where the comma already followed the year. My edit brought uniformity and also fixed a capitalization problem, but you just reverted the whole edit. I researched back to March 5, 2003, to find the first full date, and it has "on March 4, 1766, but ..." (and that's with the comma that you disapprove of). If you succeed in eliminating this rule and allowing the first editor of each article to set his or her own style, this article would still get the changes I made (adding the commas). It would also bring on a slew of edit wars on thousands of articles and waste a whole lot of time for any conscientious editor who saw conflicting styles to go back and research the article's edit history. Do you think we need new templates "Use mdy dates with comma after year" and "Use mdy dates without comma after year"? Eliminating the rule would result in sloppy-looking articles and more discord among editors and a huge waste of time. On the other hand, what was hurt by my edit that added two commas and brought uniformity to the article? It didn't make the article harder to read, but easier. Your personal taste was offended (though that was not my intent), but that shouldn't prevent making Wikipedia easier to read and more professional-looking. As for intentional offense, what do you think of telling an editor who follows the MoS that "Your edits are incorrect ... I will leave your incorrect punctuation as-is ... not worth my while to fight over misplaced commas ... your punctuational edits are wrong"? For uniformity, we need a rule to add such commas or a rule to remove them. As the rule stands now, an editor who adds a date that lacks the comma should feel no shame if another editor later adds the comma. Chris the speller ^yack 16:47, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Let's see. It is not a parenthetical phrase I don't think, in the manner of "The weather on March 12 (2005) was clear and warm" meaning "The weather on March 12 (and by the way, the year happened to be 2005) was clear and warm", since in most cases the year is important. Nor is it "The weather (on March 12, 2005) was clear and warm" since that implies that the main thing we want to get across is the nature of the weather in general (clear and warm) and the particular date or even time of year when the weather was clear and warm is trivial. Which is not usually true, for our purposes.

I once knew what an appositive is, but I had to reformat that part of my brain to make room for sports scores. But I don't think dates are apositives generally. They are unitary phrases. In which case maybe it should be ""The weather, on March 12, 2005, was clear and warm". Then you have "March 12, 2005" as unitary phrase which happens, by convention, to contain a comma within itself; and the entire phrase "on March 12, 2005" is comma-delineated.

But then that introduces an extra comma. Commas are signals to the readers to make a brief pause, and so this slows down the reader (a tiny bit, but still). So I dunno.

Probably is should be treated like the serial comma (see MOS:SERIAL). Do whatever you want, but leave alone what you find. Herostratus (talk) 17:08, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I like that approach. EEng 21:21, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

The serial comma is a touchy subject, and requires careful handling to avoid possible confusion. Even so, it says to use the same format throughout an article (it does not say to leave alone what you find). The comma after year has no such complexity; following the rule to always put a comma after the year never causes confusion and seldom offends one's taste (well, I could name one person). Dropping the rule would create a mess and lead to edit wars. This rule ain't broke; we shouldn't 'fix' it. Chris the speller ^yack 00:52, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

following the rule to always put a comma after the year never causes confusion and seldom offends. I'll show you where it offends:

On December 25, 2001 (which was Christmas Day), we all went...

That' an actual example I was given by someone claiming the commas was necessary there. Honestly, how tonedeaf can you get? I'll say it again: there are a very few places (e.g. restrictive vs. nonsrestrictive clauses) in which the presence or absence of commas matters either for grammar or for clarity. Most everywhere else they're a matter of rhythm, cadence and pacing (if those are all different... but anyway) and this is one of them. I think the guideline should say that commas after years are a matter of discretion to be worked out by article editors in context, period. EEng 01:09, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

I completely agree with EEng, but I also think there is value in consistency within an article. As Chris the speller said above, s/he added two commas after the year to make those two dates consistent with all the other dates that had a comma after the year. Before undoing those edits, Dilidor should have checked to see what style was used throughout the article. If s/he had, s/he would have seen that the style was to use a comma, and should have left Chris' edits alone. I'd like to add that, in my experience, Americans are taught to use the comma after the year – witness the Chicago Manual of Style. This is, of course, in the American date style format. The comma has nothing to do with pausing or not pausing; it is a visual marker to set the date off from the rest of the sentence. I don't think a comma is needed after a year in the British date style format. You are free, Dilidor, to start a discussion at the MoS, but I think you will come up against a lot of resistance to a new rule requiring, or a new guideline recommending, leaving out the comma after the year in the American date style format. I suggest leaving it as it is, and in a way similar to determining the variant of English used by searching the article and the article's history, we look for the preferred or dominant date style used in an article and work for consistency. I do recommend using the comma after the year in the American date style format, though.  – Corinne (talk) 01:59, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Corinne, right now MOS:COMMA specifically says there has to be a comma, so "leaving it as it is" would mean zero flexibility.

And I don't think this is important or noticeable enough to warrant a "consistent within article" provision. I think editors should be free to write both of these

January 1, 1920 started like any other day.

Before we discuss the events of January 1, 1920, I'd like to set some ground rules.

in the same article without some fussbudget insisting on "consistency". I think the guideline should simply say that with or without comma is acceptable, PERIOD. I won't initiate such a proposal over at MOS:COMMA, but if someone's brave enough to do so, I'll support it. EEng 02:16, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

But the comma in the second sentence is required because of the long dependent clause at the beginning of the sentence, regardless of the style of the date; this does not clarify the issue, it confuses it Chris the speller ^yack 04:05, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

And your arguments must be unconvincing even to you if you need to resort to the ad hominem tactic of calling another editor a "fussbudget". Let's keep this civil. Chris the speller ^yack 04:10, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

The comma is needed (not required) in the second example because it flows better with it – grammatically it could be there or not be there. One is unneeded (though not forbidden) in the first, again for flow reasons, not correctness. A strict rule in either direction forces one or the other example to be suboptimal.

People who can't write but nonetheless swoop down on articles to enforce imaginary rules are a pet peeve of mine, and I have no qualms about calling such people fussbudgets. (I'm not referring, BTW, to you, who do very precise and accurate work, in my experience.) EEng 04:49, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

The most sensible solution offered so far is not my original suggestion (eliminate the rule) but that of EEng: make it optional, using the serial comma approach as precedent. This eliminates the sense of legalism and inflexibility.

On a different topic, Chris the speller is correct concerning the comma following the initial dependent clause in EEng's example sentence above—which is a pet peeve of mine. We can make the whole problem disappear by simply avoiding initial dependent clauses and interruptive clauses. And the world will be at peace. —Dilidor (talk) 11:19, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Dilidor: Thank you for your interest in improving Wikipedia. The rule "A comma follows the year unless followed by other punctuation" is not wrong. It agrees with the Chicago Manual of Style and other style guides. Please notice that the rule is footnoted, and the footnote links to Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Commas, where it details it:

• In geographical references that include multiple levels of subordinate divisions (e.g., city, state/province, country), a comma separates each element and follows the last element unless followed by other punctuation. Dates in month–day–year format require a comma after the day, as well as after the year, unless followed by other punctuation. In both cases, the last element is treated as parenthetical.

Incorrect:	He set October 1, 2011 as the deadline for Chattanooga, Oklahoma to meet his demands.
Correct:	He set October 1, 2011, as the deadline for Chattanooga, Oklahoma, to meet his demands.

In the Incorrect example, "2011" binds more tightly to the words "as the deadline" than it does to "October 1"; the comma after "2001" helps bind the date together. And in the same example, "Oklahoma" binds more tightly to "to meet his demands" than it does to "Chattanooga"; the comma after "Oklahoma" helps bind the "city, state" construction together. (Notice that I put "city, state" in quotes; without the quotes, the word "state" would bind more closely to "construction" than to "city"!) There are numerous online sources that support this comma, including:

• "Commas". GrammarBook.com. Rule 9. Use a comma to separate the day of the month from the year, and—what most people forget!—always put one after the year, also.
    Example: It was in the Sun's June 5, 2003, edition.
• "Comma". The Punctuation Guide. When the date appears in the middle of a sentence, commas should appear both before and after the year.
    Her arrival on April 10, 1988, was considered a turning point for the company.

—Anomalocaris (talk) 17:20, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I don't buy this binding idea. English is not a programming language. There are good style books that recommend or allow omission of the comma after the year, and good writers who do so. It's not a big deal, not an oh-my-god-how-embarrassing-we-do-this-wrong. What it is iss an opportunity to remove one little arbitrary command from MOS, allowing editors to just write what they think reads best in a given situation.

I should add that omitting the comma-after-year is one of the few situations in which I knowingly disobey MOS' command (sometimes including, sometimes omitting, according to the flow of the text) and I have never to my recollection gotten any pushback on it from anyone. No one seems to care but gnomes. What I said in my parody (linked above) stands: for God's sake let there be at least one zone of discretion where editors are allowed to think for themselves without Big Brother micromanaging every goddam thing. EEng 18:37, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Please remember to capitalize the first word after a colon, as required by MOS:COLON. Kendall-K1 (talk) 02:21, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Well played, sir! EEng 02:38, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

EEng, acknowledging that you've been editing here longer than I have and that I wouldn't tell you anything that I was certain you already knew, I have to question your fairly regular statements about "MOS commandments" and various synomolies (I know). Speaking only of the style guidelines, there is no mechanism, codified or unwritten, to "deal with" editors who write section headers in title case, link France three times in one article, or break any other MOS "rule". That edits being brought into line with a house style should be seen as "micromanaging" or any other disparaging term, seems to me to be the result of some sort of vanity, as though one's edits were already perfect as written. Certainly many readers do not care about consistency, which is to say, they are not bothered by inconsistency. Some are bothered by it, though, and I think I can safely say that no one is bothered by consistency. So really, these gnoming edits are an improvement for some and a lateral move for others. I can't see a negative aspect of it. Primergrey (talk) 04:04, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Well said. Dicklyon (talk) 04:30, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Well said perhaps, but simplistic. Bringing articles into line with guidelines is a good thing, of course – all other things being equal. But now and then all other things aren't equal.

• Some of the guidelines (very few, I'm happy to say) overprescribe, usually due to the influence of Miss Snodgrass. They shouldn't be guidelines in the first place. They are micromanagement.
• Even the valid guidelines are guidelines, meant to admit exceptions and to be applied with common sense. Yet we have a small number of editors who can't seem to understand that, and insist on "enforcing MOS" in every nook and cranny of the project, no matter how inappropriate a particular guideline may be in a particular case.

Yes, no one's bothered by consistency per se, but when consistency is insisted upon to the detriment of actual quality, that is bothersome.

As for vanity, I never met anyone who wrote anything worth reading who didn't take pride in his or her work. As the great Logan P. Smith wrote, "Every author, however modest, keeps a most outrageous vanity chained like a madman in the padded cell of his breast." EEng 06:37, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for your thoughtful response. I'd like to respond in kind to observe that "pride in one's work" is also good thing per se, but can sometimes, I think, hurt an editor's ability to keep the greater goal of the project in mind (something that many gnomes have also been accused of, not always wrongly, I'm sure). I think the disconnect stems from the difficulty some editors have in imagining how I or anyone else could be proud of adding a comma or de-linking a country.

The fact is, I'm not. I also feel no pride when an editor has an issue with MOS compliant changes and I "get to win" because the "rules" support me. I, honestly, am proud when I've copyedited an already well written article and made it a well written article that is sync with so many others.

This is probably better suited for your TP, I know, but posting anything serious there is a daunting proposition (no offense intended). Primergrey (talk) 13:16, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Agree. All that leaves is the question of what "in sync" should mean i.e. what MOS should prescribe, and on what it should remain silent – the eternal question. EEng 16:17, 27 April 2017 (UTC) I can't imagine how this conversation would be suited to my toilet paper. What a strange idea.

Possibly the best solution would be a line at the beginning of each article containing a couple dozen commas, and also some semicolons, quotation marks, and so forth. The reader could then be instructed to mentally sprinkle them throughout the text in whatever manner she finds pleasing. Herostratus (talk) 02:35, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Discussion regarding date linking on portal date-specific pages

Please come participate in the discussion at WP:VPP#Date links on portal date-specific pages. Thank you. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 17:48, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

Time of day

"Context determines whether the 12- or 24-hour clock is used ... " says the guideline, and that's all. This has been used as an excuse by Europeans from non-English speaking countries, when writing in English on enWP, generally to impose 14:35 rather than 2:35 PM pm (for example) upon all of us working with this project, no matter what the actual context. Being bi-continental, and a translator, I have grown up with these problems and worked with them for over 50 years. It is my firm conviction that military time, aka the 24-hour clock, normally is confusing to people in English-speaking countries and is not normally used (knowledgeably) in English text. Even in Britain, that time format is only used on a few formal documents and a bits of rare transportation information. Google seems to clearly bear me out on that. Couldn't our guideline be more specific as to what is meant by "context", since "context" is now being interpreted as "do as you please even if most people will be confused". --SergeWoodzing (talk) 11:20, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

It's only called "military time" in North America, see para 3 of 24-hour clock. Para 4 gives the history, which is possibly a lot longer than you might think. My working life has been spent in the computer industry and probably that's why I tend to use the 24 hour clock in ordinary life (and I'm a Yorkshire-born Brit who's spent all his life here, not a European). Certainly it is used widely, not rarely, in all forms of transportation and virtually exclusively for things like tide tables and almanacs. I agree that some people often take a moment to add or subtract the 12 hours, but you do the population a disservice to state that it "normally is confusing".

The question of which form to use in Wikipedia shouldn't rely on perceptions of common colloquialisms however. Wiki tries to be an encyclopaedia and use a more formal, precise language. I would suggest to you that you need to frame your proposal from this standpoint, and you also need to address "pm" or "p.m." (by the way, "PM" is not acceptable, see MOS:TIME) and that's assuming that Latin abbreviations don't upset other editors. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 12:14, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

Can you give some examples? I think it would be difficult for us to give precise guidance. For example, in my experience 24 hour times are common for transportation in the UK, but not in the US. Any guideline we try to write would be full of exceptions and corner cases. Kendall-K1 (talk) 12:19, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

Have y'all googled this? E.G. "is military time used in Britain"? I know we cannot use informal Internet Q&As or blogs as sources, but the confusion we cause seems obvious with something like this and, to me, is totally unnecessary. 2 pm isn't going to go away as standard English. Wouldn't it be better to have people try to pick up on, and get used to, what's normal in English text, all over the world, rather than trying to teach (force upon) them what's normal in Swedish (Swedish language) text, but not in English (English language) text?--SergeWoodzing (talk) 17:50, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

I have not "googled" anything. You brought this up. The burden is on you to give us examples of where the MOS has failed, and a proposal as to how you would like to fix it. So far you have given one example, which looks more like a content dispute to me, and no proposals. Kendall-K1 (talk) 19:14, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

• As usual (and per Kendall) there's no point in talking about this until we see some actual examples in actual articles. Until then it's just the usual MOS philosophizing. EEng 18:41, 4 May 2017 (UTC)

As usual (in spite of over 10 years experience regularly with Wikipedia) there is no point in my trying to get something discussed, when I see something that I really think is wrong, because I obviously never (never) know what I'm doing, get dismissed accordingly and the problem is still there. Someone suggested this forum. I'm sorry it is just not possible for me to research more examples you for several days. I thought one might be enough, plus the very obvious attitudes of the general public (Google). I should have known better. Maybe I'll try an RfC on the article's talk page. Bye! --SergeWoodzing (talk) 10:53, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

I mean, right. Come on, User:SergeWoodzing has said it's a problem he's run into, so I'm inclined to believe that it's a problem he's run into. True, though, a few particular examples would help to illustrate.

"Context determines whether the 12- or 24-hour clock is used" is, after all, pretty vague. If we had for instance "Context determines whether BC–AD or BCE–CE should be used" with no shred of further guidance that would be considered unsatisfactory. Right?

The current rule, with no further elucidation, does seem to imply "do what you like". Which possibly is best, I dunno. But if so it should maybe say so directly, with a prescription against changing what you find, except that articles should be internally consistent, as is done for the serial comma.

Unless it's a WP:ENGVAR thing, IMO it ought to say "Use the 12 hour clock", basically. The 24 hour clock is not used in America as a rule and is confusing to American readers probably. If the default in Britain etc. we can add the usual ENGVAR langauage or just say some variation of "its an ENGVAR thing, see ENGVAR.

We obviously have to leave some wriggle room. There may be contexts where the 24 hour clock is appropriate (although I can't think of any right off, at least for America; even in a military context I think we would say "the attack commenced at 10:00 pm" rather than "the attack commenced at 22:00" since we are writing for a general audience and not writing an after-action report for our colonel. Of course direct quotes that use the 24 hour clock shouldn't be changed.

So "Use the 12 hour clock, generally, unless a specific need to use the 24 hour clock is demonstrated" or something. Of course leaving the wriggle room leads to "it happened in Europe, so that demonstrates a specific need to use the 24 hour clock" which is tedious. But you have to leave the wriggle room. Herostratus (talk) 11:46, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

is confusing to American readers probably I doubt it. --Izno (talk) 12:20, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

What is the reasonable basis for your doubt? We have quite a variety or readers here. And your edit summary was "23:59 is not hard to understand". I think what you meant to say say is "23:59 is not hard to understand for me personally". And that's different. Herostratus (talk) 12:28, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

What reasonable basis do you have for your assertion that Americans may be confused by the notation? Please don't flip the burden of proof. --Izno (talk) 12:36, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

• Getting back to the original post, SergeWoodzing made several questionable assertions. This has been used as an excuse by Europeans from non-English speaking countries, when writing in English on enWP, generally to impose 14:35 rather than 2:35 pm – where's the evidence that it's people from non-English speaking countries who use the 24 hour clock here? I would always do so in formal writing because it removes ambiguity. Even in Britain, that time format is only used on a few formal documents and a bits of rare transportation information – nonsense; it's used on every bus, railway and flight electronic information board I've ever seen in the UK and in the corresponding printed timetables, as is easy to demonstrate by searching online. The guideline is fine as it is; if it were changed it should move towards suggesting the least ambiguous format, namely the 24 hour clock. Peter coxhead (talk) 13:05, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

See Sittinbourne & Kemsley Light Railway timetable for example. Interesting that it uses both formats! Martin of Sheffield (talk) 13:59, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Why complicate matters unnecessarily? (after 50 years of trying I still don't understand what is meant by 12 am, or 12 pm). If in doubt, the 24 hour clock should be preferred, for the reasons given by Peter coxhead. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 15:02, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

• I wasn't clear. When I said there's no point in talking about this until we see some actual examples in actual articles. Until then it's just the usual MOS philosophizing, I meant that we need to see examples of article editing situations where either "the wrong outcome" was arrived at, or excessive editor time was consumed before arriving at the "right" outcome, and changing the guideline would fix that. If it's not possible to give such examples, there's no point in changing the guidelines. EEng 16:07, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Maybe. On the other hand, if people are writing stuff like "By 15:30, the fire had spread to the main building..." in articles, that's a problem even if people aren't fighting over it, because it's hard to read, for Americans anyway.

OK. It sounds like this is a WP:ENGVAR thing, and nothing wrong with that. We should set it up as an ENGVAR thing thing.

@User:Izno, the reasonable basis that I have for your assertion that Americans may be confused by the notation is that I live in America and I know. You don't or if you do don't get around enough I'd say. You have not met my in-laws apparently. Nobody -- and I mean, literally, basically nobody -- uses 24 hour notation in America. I don't believe I have ever once heard somebody say "off to lunch, back at thirteen-thirty". It would be considered both peculiar and opaque. Timetables don't work like that, TV schedules don't work like that, very little works like that except computer system timestamps and the Army.

Yes, sure, I get it that many, maybe most, literate Americans are familiar with the concept of what we call "military time" and can translate 24 hour time: "OK, 'By 15:30, the fire had spread to the main building...' let's see that's... 12-13-14-15... 3:30". Why slow down the reader that way for no gain? Many literate Americans can also translate "au contraire" or whatever, but we don't just randomly write "Strauss had hoped this would expand sales, but au contraire revenues actually fell" for no reason.

And of course, some subset of Americans can't translate 24 hour time. Schoolkids for instance. I mean, 46% of American voters voted for Donald Trump. Not to cast aspersions, but just as an actual question, how many of them do you think understand 24 hour time at all let alone facilely? I mean some, sure, but...

There's two ways to handle this. The MOS:SERIAL way -- "Do what you like, but leave what you found", which is basically what we have now, or the WP:ENGVAR way, where it depends on various factors such as the article topic. Where the Canadians and Australians etc. fit in I don't know. Articles should probably be internally consistent I guess. Whether it should say "American-subject articles should use 12 hour time, English-subject articles should use 24 hour time" or "American-subject articles should use 12 hour time, English-subject articles can use either 12 or 24 time, depending on the first edit establishing a time, please maintain consistency within articles" is up to the British to say.

Or we could do nothing. Nothing might be OK too. The current guideline is mediocre, but it's not a crisis I guess. This would leave it at "do what you like".

(As to 12:00 am and pm, these are specialized cases where it is best to write "midnite" and "noon" and we should probably say so (FWIW midnite is 12am as the new morning begins on the stroke of turning 12, and noon conversely is 12pm)). Herostratus (talk) 16:55, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Herostratus: I also live in America--why else would I question you? You should review what your assertion was re Nobody [...] uses 24 hour notation in America, since I have not disputed that statement. The statement I disputed was is confusing to American readers probably. And then you get wormy about Americans having to do the translation. You seem to continue changing your goalposts. --Izno (talk) 17:06, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Hero (one of my favorite editors) says, On the other hand, if people are writing stuff like "By 15:30, the fire had spread to the main building..." in articles, that's a problem even if people aren't fighting over it. Well, if people are writing that stuff, and it's a problem, and someone can shows us examples of it, why hasn't that person attempted to change it in those articles? If not, then for all we know this could just be fixed in those articles, with no debate and no need for a guidelines change. That's what I mean by Until then it's just the usual MOS philosophizing. "Problems" that were never even the subject of talk page discussion aren't problems. EEng 17:13, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

@EEng: ah, but the real work (i.e. developing articles) is hard; MoS philosophizing is so much easier – no need to find, understand and summarize sources, just say whatever you think. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:38, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

I prefer to take the more generous view that the philosophizers are taking a break from the hard work of article-building. EEng 18:52, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Quite. I believe "slumming" is the operative term. I'll let be known I have been labeled a "bloviator" by Wikipediocracy (If I can now just get them to call me a "public scold" and a a "shrill harpy" I can fill in my bingo card), so where else would I be found but at MOS discussions. @EEng:, who is well advised to avoid violations of WP:NPC: yes you and I often in agreement that "let the editor do what she wants, the world will not end, and there are morale benefits". This, though, is a reasonable thing for an MOS to address and adjudicate, I think. Herostratus (talk) 22:05, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Show me the article-talk discussions that would have been avoided, or which came to a "bad outcome", because this guideline wasn't different from (than?) it is. EEng 22:13, 5 May 2017 (UTC) You're still my Hero.

Well, point (although I think the gentleperson noted that here we have "no need to find, understand and summarize sources, just say whatever you think", although maybe they were being sarcastic). OP averred that it had happened to them. But even one diff would be helpful. User:SergeWoodzing, can you produce such a diff? Herostratus (talk) 22:23, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

• Impressive discussion now, thank you all!

Actually, when I posted here, I had overlooked this "Prefer vocabulary common to all varieties of English.", which, as placed at the top of the guideline, already sort of settles the matter, ay? There is only one option in this case, as far as I know. And none of you seem to have asserted that military time is "common to all varieties of English" in giving the hour of, say, a terrorist attack in Stockholm? --SergeWoodzing (talk) 20:04, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Well then, everything is all Sir Garnet. This puts a new colour on matters. Perhaps this bit of advice can be brought down to the body of the time-of-day rule to avoid further confusion, and everything will be shipshape and Bristol fashion. Herostratus (talk) 22:05, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Searching on "at 15:30" randomly I found that:

• Most uses were British or European or anyway non-American subjects. (IMO there's a difference between "a bus departing Claverham at 15:30" at Hooe, East Sussex (mostly local interest) and "At 15:30 on 26 May, Hitler ordered the panzer groups to continue their advance" at Dunkirk evacuation (universal interest), but I recognize that this an argument that can never be won.)
• Some were in situations where local conditions don't apply, such as "Closest approach of 200 kilometres (120 mi) at 15:30 UTC on 10 July 1992" at List of missions to comets, describing an event in outer space where there is no "afternoon". Arguable. "...over twenty times greater than the estimated age of the universe: approximately 292 billion years from now, at 15:30:08 UTC on Sunday, 4 December 292,277,026,596" at Year 2038 problem describes when all our computers will stop working. I can see how "At 3:30pm on Sunday, 4 December, 292,277,026,596" sounds a bit off, and anyway applies everywhere.
• However, a few were American: "At 15:30 UTC on October 15, Hazel made landfall just west of the North Carolina" at Hurricane Hazel. "arriving at her berth at 15:30 13 March 1999 to a crowd of citizens, dignitaries, veterans, and civic officials" at USS Massachusetts (BB-59).

I think these latter, at least, are wrong. It's not crisis, but it a low-level degradation of the accessibity of the material. I understand where they probably came from: source documents from weather scientists in the first case, military people in the second. IMO it's lazy to not fix these these.

"The race was held over a duration of 24 hours, starting at 3:30pm on Saturday, January 28" at 2012 24 Hours of Daytona, would, if changed to "at 15:30", be even worse. However, it doesn't say that, and no point inventing theoretical problems.

IMO MOS:COMMONALITY would tend to indicate use of 12 hour time generally if it is common in Britain (and Canada etc.). If a British person were to read ""At 3:30 pm on 26 May, Hitler ordered the panzer groups to continue their advance" and think "well that just looks odd" MOS:COMMONALITY might not apply. If they had to think "OK... that means... hold on... yes, 15:30" to understand the time of the event, then MOS:COMMONALITY would definitely not apply. I don't know if this is the situation or not.

Indian and other non-Anglosphere readers might matter some. They're a secondary consideration, but many of our readers are ESL cases, some of whom might have enough trouble already accessing the material, and if "3:30 pm" makes them pause and stumble, that's a data point.

@User:Izno, I guess we just disagree. Have you graduated college perhaps? That could be the problem right there. Most people have not graduated college. This is something to keep in mind I think. And Americans are pretty provincial. Most speak only the one language and know less about the world than outsiders realize, I think. Herostratus (talk) 00:27, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

Oh, great. First you drag in Trump, and now Hitler. EEng 00:36, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

• Serious points: when "UTC" is used, it does seem wrong to use the 12 hour clock: "1:03 pm UTC"?? Readers who don't understand the 24 hour clock will surely not understand or be interested in "UTC" either. In running text in non-specialized contexts, I agree that the 12 hour clock has the merits of MOS:COMMONALITY. The existing guideline covers this perfectly well. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:43, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

Everyone knows what UTC is -- it's the barcode they scan at the cash register. You think we're all yokels or something? EEng 09:17, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

I thought it was a mistake to switch from GMT to UTC for most common things. The difference is negligible in most cases, and people were just starting to get comfortable with GMT. I bet we even have some articles that incorrectly give UTC times for historic events that originally were marked in GMT. Kendall-K1 (talk) 19:36, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

Aren't they the same? UTC says "For most purposes, UTC is considered interchangeable with GMT".

Tunis has "On 7 May 1943, at 15:30 in the afternoon" which at first seems an error, but on reconsideration might be an attempt at a functional belt-and-suspenders solution, and it got to me thinking that maybe all we need is an addition to {{Convert}}. It should be simple. Thus "...attacked Lobau at 16:30" would be "...attacked Lobau at 16:30 (4:30 pm)" or ""...attacked Lobau at 4:30 pm (16:30)". Wouldn't this the best solution? Herostratus (talk) 21:08, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

UTC is, like, 573/8,000,000 of a second different from GMT because of the relativistic effects of the drag Jupiter imposes on the angular momentum of the sun. Or something. Other than for astronomers and network administrators, they're the same.

Please, let's not suggest a dual presentation. [Later clarification: By this I mean let's not have a dual presentation of 12-hr format and 24-hr format, nothing to do with GMT/UTC.] In about 5 seconds someone can learn to convert from one to the other. EEng 21:44, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

@EEng: I don't think it is the GMT/UTC issue that Herostratus is suggesting, it's the 12/24 conversion. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 22:50, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

I understood that, and my post was confusing because it involved both the GMT/UTC issue and the 12/24 issue. We do, in fact, sometimes present times in both a dual "local + UTC" format, but never a dual "12 + 24" format. It was the latter I was discouraging. EEng 23:26, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

Well, a dual format is better than a just-24 format which -- I seem to be having trouble convincing people of this, but that doesn't make it any less true -- many people can't read easily, and a non-trivial number can't read at all. Yeah people can learn to convert, but the same is true of kilos/pounds and meters/feet and we convert those.

I mean, I would have thought that a 12-format (when we're talking local time) would be the solution. But apparently British people find this either odd or actually opaque? I'm not sure, but maybe. And if so then we need to be converting so as to offer a format that everyone can read. Herostratus (talk) 04:33, 8 May 2017 (UTC)

In speech, my experience is that people in both English-speaking North America and the UK are much more likely to say "a quarter to three" than "2:45" or "half past seven" than "19:30", so this form is more quickly understood in both countries. Should we use it here? No. Speech and formal writing are different: the former has a context and uses language not employed in the latter. In formal writing there are contexts where the 12 hour clock is right, and contexts where the 24 hour clock is right. Leave the present guidance alone, and stop trying to micromanage editors. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:43, 8 May 2017 (UTC)

You may have been hoist with your own petard on this one, Herostratus. EEng 12:48, 8 May 2017 (UTC)

Enh, I think this is different. Sure, you don't want to micromanage editors on a lot of stuff. That doesn't mean you shouldn't have rules when it serves the reader. In this case its a matter of serving the reader.

It's kind of like a feet-meters thing. If an editor was of the mind "I want to write '12 meters' here and I don't want to use the {{convert}} template or otherwise specify the distance in feet, as I don't actually believe there are any readers who don't understand the simple English statement '12 meters', so please don't micromanage me on this", I wouldn't really support that approach, and invoking the magic term "micromanage" would not much change my opinion.

Some American readers don't understand military time, and a lot more of them don't read it easily. Apparently some editors above don't believe this. That they don't believe it doesn't make it any less true, though.

I still haven't gotten a clear picture on whether British (and Canadian etc, and also ESL non-native-speaker European etc.) readers understand 12 hour time easily. If they don't, we need a convert function. If they do, we should use 12 hour time except in specialized cases, such as when we are not describing an event in local time. Herostratus (talk) 11:53, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Having lived in most of the English speaking parts of the world, I'm pretty sure there is no place where 12-hour clock is not understood, and I don't think anyone in this discussion is saying that. There may be places where it seems odd in certain contexts, like the example above of a Panzer attack that starts at 3:30 pm or a bus that leaves at 4:15 pm, but it would certainly be understood. I do not find the ESL argument persuasive. We can't guard against the possibility of using any English expression that might not be understood by non-native speakers. The prospect of including a conversion for every appearance of time-of-day in every article is too horrible to contemplate. Kendall-K1 (talk) 12:09, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Arbor-treeish break

I'm aware there are a few topic areas (hurricanes/weather events, military history, maybe others) where guidelines (maybe informal) call for use of 24-hr format. Can someone point to examples of other articles where there was argument over which format to use? I agree that 12-hr format should be universally understandable, if not always the natural format for some readers for some topics. EEng 15:22, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Conflicts

Is it Cretan Revolt (1866–1869) or Cretan Revolt (1866–69); Ecuadorian–Peruvian territorial dispute of 1857–60 or Ecuadorian–Peruvian territorial dispute of 1857–1860? The examples use different styles.--Zoupan 03:23, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

See WP:DATERANGE; the preference used to be for XXXX-XX, but a year or two ago that was turned on its head, so that now XXXX-XXXX is favored, except in narrow circumstances. I assume that reversal should extend to article titles, but I suggest you open a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Article titles. The years might also be seen, I suppose, as a disambiguation, so you might also put a pointer at Wikipedia_talk:Disambiguation to the main discussion. EEng 03:58, 5 May 2017 (UTC)