DATE-OBS='31/12/99'

[Preben Grosbol]

William Pence wrote:

>I would go further than Rob, however, and suggest that we extend the
>definition of DATE-OBS keyword to allow the full ISO 8601 data/time format,
>in addition to the current dd/mm/yy format.  Thus all the following
>examples would be legal:
>
>     DATE-OBS= '24/06/98' 
>     DATE-OBS= '2010-02-13T13:53:10.3Z' 
>     DATE-OBS= '2010-02-13'

 It seems clear that a new date format should use the ISO 8601 definition.
However, I am still concerned with old reader getting a new format in
the date value string. As a simple example here is a FORTRAN-77
program 

      PROGRAM DATEOBS
C
      INTEGER       IDD, IMM, IYY
      CHARACTER*80  CARD1, CARD2, CARD3
C
      CARD1 = 'DATE-OBS= ''24/06/98''                / FITS standard'
      CARD2 = 'DATE-OBS= ''2010-02-13''              / ISO date'
      CARD3 = 'DATE-OBS= ''2010-02-13T13:53:10.3Z''  / ISO date/time'
C
      WRITE(6,1000) CARD1
 1000 FORMAT(A72)
      READ(CARD1,500) IDD,IMM,IYY
 500  FORMAT(11X,I2,X,I2,X,I2)
      WRITE(6,1001) IYY,IMM,IDD
 1001 FORMAT('Year ',I2,', Month: ',I2,', Day: ',I2)
C
      WRITE(6,1000) CARD2
      READ(CARD2,500) IDD,IMM,IYY
      WRITE(6,1001) IYY,IMM,IDD
C
      WRITE(6,1000) CARD3
      READ(CARD3,500) IDD,IMM,IYY
      WRITE(6,1001) IYY,IMM,IDD
C
      END

which on a SunOS gives:

 ns2{~/tmp}223: f77 dateobs.for -o dateobs
 dateobs.for:
  MAIN dateobs:
 ns2{~/tmp}224: dateobs
 DATE-OBS= '24/06/98'                / FITS standard
 Year 98, Month:  6, Day: 24
 DATE-OBS= '2010-02-13'              / ISO date
 Year -2, Month:  0, Day: 20
 DATE-OBS= '2010-02-13T13:53:10.3Z'  / ISO date/time
 Year -2, Month:  0, Day: 20

 Although most FITS readers would be more clever there may still be
a few 'old' trivial programs left.

 It is clear that all major organizations will be able to implement
the change but there are also smaller sites.

Preben Grosbol