27.2 Calendar date items

A calendar date item specifies a day of the year. It is specified differently, depending on whether the month is specified numerically or literally. All these strings specify the same calendar date:

1972-09-24 # ISO 8601. 72-9-24 # Assume 19xx for 69 through 99, # 20xx for 00 through 68. 72-09-24 # Leading zeros are ignored. 9/24/72 # Common U.S. writing. 24 September 1972 24 Sept 72 # September has a special abbreviation. 24 Sep 72 # Three-letter abbreviations always allowed. Sep 24, 1972 24-sep-72 24sep72

The year can also be omitted. In this case, the last specified year is used, or the current year if none. For example:

9/24 sep 24

Here are the rules.

For numeric months, the ISO 8601 format `year-month-day' is allowed, where year is any positive number, month is a number between 01 and 12, and day is a number between 01 and 31. A leading zero must be present if a number is less than ten. If year is 68 or smaller, then 2000 is added to it; otherwise, if year is less than 100, then 1900 is added to it. The construct `month/day/year', popular in the United States, is accepted. Also `month/day', omitting the year.

Literal months may be spelled out in full: `January', `February', `March', `April', `May', `June', `July', `August', `September', `October', `November' or `December'. Literal months may be abbreviated to their first three letters, possibly followed by an abbreviating dot. It is also permitted to write `Sept' instead of `September'.

When months are written literally, the calendar date may be given as any of the following:

day month year day month month day year day-month-year

Or, omitting the year:

month day