This is the discussion/talk page for: Template:Dts.

Topics from 2007-2008

This template has no error checking for missing params, like day or month, and it should, since date can sort without them. It broke our Help:Sorting#Dates section, too! To convert existing tables in the DD-MM-YYYY format to something pretty, and to do it easily, it needs to be able to take the standard DD-MM-YYYY or DD-MM-YY format. In those cases, there would be no need to error check. Maybe it could just check parameter {{{1}}}, perhaps, for dashes and then directly print the full string hidden, then wikilinked, and Mediawiki will do the rest. Let me know if that part doesn't make sense. Sorry I can't figure out how to do that myself.—Wikibarista 17:16, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The acronym is great, but unfortunately, it's being used incorrectly already by people to just put in dates anywhere in an article. We should rename it to "sortdate" to avoid misuse, because the misuse will cause pages to be larger when they're converted to HTML. —Wikibarista 18:02, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Centralized discussion for all issues surrounding sortkeys for wikitables created here: Template talk:Sort. ~ trialsanderrors 09:02, 5 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My Special:Preferences have the date presentation set to "2001-01-15T16:12:34". Yet when template is passed {{Dts|15|January|2001}} I get the output of "15 January 2001". Surely I should be seeing the same output as what [[January 15]] [[2001]] would give me, which is "2001-01-15". What's gone wrong? --Oscarthecat 16:46, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I fixed it, it was due to a blank space in the year link: [[12 April]] [[2007 ]] gives 12 April 2007 .--Patrick 07:25, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the quick response Patrick. Yes, now working great. --Oscarthecat 20:32, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Great work this weekend! I noted dts doesn't play nice with {{sortdate}} in the same table. I might be wrong on that, I'll have to look later. —Wikibarista 00:28, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A-ha, I see it. dts has a leading 0 whereas sortdate does not. —Wikibarista 00:35, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have added the zero in sortdate.--Patrick 08:54, 3 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It seems like this template is breaking the sortable list of wii games, around the game "Wii Play". I have been unable to solve the problem, is any template coder capable of providing advanced help around? --User:Krator (t c) 14:43, 26 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It seems the limit per Wikipedia:Template limits is reached on the page. --User:Krator (t c) 15:07, 26 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I motion that we change the entry format for this template from MM-DD-YYYY to YYYY-MM-DD. Pretty much all of the templates that require date entry are using YYYY-MM-DD ( {{Age in days}} is one I use often), and this should be changed to conform to that. I think that's standard - even the citation templates use that format. Gary King (talk) 02:36, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Based on recent changes to date formats (in particular, date autoformatting) in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style for dates, I would like to suggest that "link=off" should be the default setting so that dates are not automatically linked when not specifying a parameter (likely to be the most common usage). If editors wish to link dates, they can set "link=on". Truthanado (talk) 00:15, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A lot of people who use this template might then wonder why the links are now off; they might think something is broken, perhaps. Gary King (talk) 03:00, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That kind of confusion is already happening with the major change in the way dates are handled now. In the interest of moving forward to a consistent system, maybe that's an acceptable "bump in the road". Truthanado (talk) 11:32, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't mind; I created that feature in this template and would like to see the default as unlinked. But of course, I'm always a fan of consensus, too :) Gary King (talk) 14:14, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think if the policy is to have unlinked dates, then the template ought to be made to be consistent with that policy. It is true that some people might think the template is broken, but then that should hopefully lead them to discover the change in policy, which would be a good thing in the long run! Mrh30 (talk) 09:27, 10 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You can set the default to be 'link=off' because all articles now use it for dts (and for the now deprecated dts2 template). The default will be useful for new uses. Lightmouse (talk) 13:30, 25 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Done Gary King (talk) 19:02, 25 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 17:37, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I thought I had already asked this question, but apparently not. :) Is it possible to make this template display a date without the year, i.e. just day and month? PC78 (talk) 23:16, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No, not with its current setup. Gary King (talk) 23:20, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What I mean is, is it feasible to make this change to the template? PC78 (talk) 00:42, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This feature was not implemented probably because it wasn't requested that often. It can be done, though. In which article it is needed? Gary King (talk) 04:27, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've been using it in articles such as List of South Korean films of 2006, where repeating the years seems rather redundant and takes up space. PC78 (talk) 13:39, 25 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay done. {{dts||10|25}} will show as October 25; it will be sorted along with other dates that do have years, and it's year will be considered as whatever the current year is (so in this case, it would be sorted as 2008-10-25). Gary King (talk) 21:19, 25 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks! PC78 (talk) 13:21, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Topics from 2009-2010

Is it possible to use this table with approximate dates? I'm thinking of dates in the format "c.", "before", "after", "16/17 November" etc. The question relates to List of the titled nobility of England and Ireland 1300–1309 which is currently nominated for FL, where it has been suggested that a sortable list be used. I've found this problematic with so many approximate dates. Lampman (talk) 13:24, 21 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That's not possible with the current code. Regarding implementing it, I think it'd be easier to write custom code for the specific article rather than rewriting this template. Just use {{sort}} to do what you want; the first parameter is for sorting, the second is for what you actually want to appear. Gary King (talk) 16:24, 21 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

19-Mar-2009: I have added subheaders above as "Topics from 2007-2008" (etc.) to emphasize the dates of topics in the talk-page. Older topics might still apply, but using the year headers helps to focus on more current issues as well. -Wikid77 (talk) 12:38, 19 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

19-March-2009: I have created the temporary variation Template:Dts/ver to allow reporting invalid dates. That template could be merged at a later time, after options are fully developed.
Naturally, sometimes people are putting day-number for the month, where 21 gives "September" (21-12=9), 23 gives "November" etc. As in other templates, I was expecting an error-page-category, such as "Category:Template dts invalid month pages" which would silently list all pages with invalid month numbers passed to {{dts}}. Another method, coded in Template:Dts/ver, leaves the default behavior unchanged, but allows an optional verify-switch "v=yes" when invoking dts:

{{dts/ver|v=yes |2009|78|55}}   <--verify to report 78 & 55.

{{nowrap|{{dts|2009|1|1}}}}

{{dts|nowrap=on|2009|1|1}}

*ISO
**{{dts|1990-09-03}}
**{{dts|1990-09-03|format=dmy}}
**{{dts|1990-09-03|format=mdy}}



*International
**{{dts|12 March 1990}}
**{{dts|12 March 1990|format=dmy}}
**{{dts|12 March 1990|format=mdy}}

**{{dts|12 Mar 1990}}
**{{dts|12 Mar 1990|format=dmy}}
**{{dts|12 Mar 1990|format=mdy}}



*US
**{{dts|March 23, 1990}}
**{{dts|March 23, 1990|format=dmy}}
**{{dts|March 23, 1990|format=mdy}}

**{{dts|Mar 23, 1990}}
**{{dts|Mar 23, 1990|format=dmy}}
**{{dts|Mar 23, 1990|format=mdy}}



*Wrong
**{{dts|12 March, 1990}}
**{{dts|March 23 1990}}
**{{dts|12 march 1990}}
**{{dts|MARCH 23, 1990}}