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Date Format


KannikaP

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3 hours ago, Bangkok Barry said:

Related to this I suppose, I like the way in Scandinavia they put the street name first and then the number. And not only in Scandinavia but other European countries too, if memory serves. Totally logical, as first you need to know what the street is called before moving on to find the property.

Yes, "Downing Street 10", for example, is so much more logical, and easier to locate, than "10 Downing Street".

Edited by Liverpool Lou
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8 hours ago, Moti24 said:

I shouldn't have read this post; it's started me off again!

 

If I hear the words, "American English" again, I swear I'm going to burst a blood vessel.

 

There's only, "English".

And what are Indian Americans and American Indians, and why is it funny when a Native American goes to a restaurant, and the maitre d' asks: "Do you have a reservation?"

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8 hours ago, poppysdad said:

I’m as British as it can be and I prefer the old imperial measurements. If anyone asks me how tall I am I tell them in feet and inches and tell them to convert it themselves, I much prefer Fahrenheit to centigrade for temperature and I’m so many stones and pounds not rediculous kilos. But yes I can easily work in metric because it was forced upon us and having had a proper education can use both. 

But do you know how many barleycorns there are to a pole or how many perches in a chain?

The UK adopted the logical metric system back in 1965 quite voluntarily but they decided it was too expensive to change the road signs so kept those in miles. And too expensive to replace glass in pubs and milk bottles, so they held on to pints for those.

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5 hours ago, Davedub said:

The Americanism I find really unfathomable is the use of a weight measure (ounces) to quantify volume of liquid.

 

Perhaps in metric countries we could follow their lead:

 

         'May I have a half kilo of beer please!?'

 

Oh, and 'entree' - the French word for starter. How on earth did a word that actually sounds like 'entry' end up being the American word for the main course? Is it because TV dinners are often eaten on-a-tray'?

 

But the biggest contradiction has to be the simplification of the English language (dropping the 'u' from colour and favourite, replacing all known collective nouns with the word 'bunch') juxtaposed with the continued use of the uncessarily complicated imperial measurement system and the use of confusing, jumbled up date formats.

 

As our cousins over the pond might say 'go figure!'

 

(Not bashing Americans here, us Brits hold onto plenty of inexplicable cultural traits too ???? )

 

 

But the metric system also uses the same basis for volume derivation.

 

A cubic inch of water weighs one ounce and a pint should have weighed a pound (16 oz) but it was decided in 1824 to replace the various different gallon formats with a single definition that it should weigh 10lb. With 8 pints to the gallon it meant that each pint weighs a pound and a quarter or 20 oz.

 

In metric a cubic centimetre of water weighs one gram and a litre weighs a kilogram so if you order a half kilo of beer you'll get 500cc or half a litre....

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On 9/12/2023 at 2:18 PM, bignok said:

Strange people. They still use yards and inches.

Lol... Actually we use feet and inches... but why split meters, I mean hairs.

 

I think the answer to everyone's questions is that America and England were once the same - language, accents, government, units of measure, date formats etc..

 

While our language and government diverged. When England/UK migrated to the "continent's" way of doing things, the US did not. Not saying the US way is better, it may not be... It's just different and works for the US... Same as Thailand driving on the "wrong" side of road... just different and works for them, us... I get confused... lol

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10 hours ago, brianthainess said:

Yes its a bloody nuisance, I write a word in English and get a spell check, then it makes me think I have made a mistake but I haven't, bloody Google thinks everyone is a frigging yank.

Two things I'm not positive about:

1. If select British (UK) English in your spell checker it may help with that?

2. Google is an American company... maybe yank is the default?

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12 hours ago, brianthainess said:

Yes its a bloody nuisance, I write a word in English and get a spell check, then it makes me think I have made a mistake but I haven't, bloody Google thinks everyone is a frigging yank.

Change your spell check to UK English. 

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On 9/12/2023 at 12:49 PM, KannikaP said:

Why do Americans put the Month before the Day in their format? In 'English' 9-11 means the 9th November, logically.

According to your logic. Same can be asked, why do you think that your way is the right way?

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On 9/12/2023 at 3:34 AM, richard_smith237 said:

Utterly confusing, totally unnecessary... upside-down and inside out..

 

Putting MM before DD in a MM-DD-YYYY format is just idiotic.

 

I've worked for numerous international companies and the ones which use the MM-DD-YY format always suffer some sort of delay, fault or issue as a result.

 

IMO the ONLY valid date format for international use is DD-MMM-YYYY to avoid any confusion whatsoever... i.e. 24-JAN-2024  this is complete unambiguous and removes every dash of doubt or misunderstanding.

 

 

 

They are both easy to understand and if its that difficult to comprehend then maybe the issue lies somewhere else

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