From Wikitravel

[edit] Draft and discussion

<begin draft for discussion>

Times

Use the format of 10:30AM-5PM.

Use noon and midnight, not 12AM or 12PM.

Note:

• Decimals not used when not required, eg not 5:00PM.
• Where decimals are required, colon used as the separator, eg not 5.30PM or 5-30PM.
• Ante meridiem and post meridiem abbreviated and capitalised as AM and PM.
• Spaces and periods (fullstops) left out, eg not 10:30 A.M. – 5 P.M.
• 12-hour format rather than 24-hour format, eg 5PM, not 1700.

Days

Abbreviate to the minimum number of letters, ie M Tu W Th F Sa Su.

Exceptions:

• Spell out when it is part of a named day, eg Good Friday, Fat Tuesday.
• If it looks odd or ambiguous in a particular context, spell it out.

We should use 2 Letters for each day, ie. Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa Su. This is more consistent and readable, and, in my opinion also more intuitive. (M 10am-3pm vs Mo 10am-3pm) - Nils Jan 8th, 2004

Months

Abbreviate to three letters, ie Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec.

Dates

Use the format of 10 Jan 2003 (as dates appear when you add a name and time signature using 4 tildes).

• Never use dates of the form 10/1/03. This example would mean 10 Jan 2003 or 1 Oct 2003 to different people.

<end main draft>

Points for possible discussion

• Abbrevn for ante meridiem and post meridiem. I prefer am and pm to AM and PM - the full words aren't capitalised.
  • I prefer lowercase too. -phma 19:27, 26 Dec 2003 (PST)

• Abbrevs for months.

• Date format.

Holidays occurring on a fixed date

I expect that most people, including those not from a Christian tradition, know that Christmas Day is 25 Dec. But not every one will know the date of Boxing Day or ANZAC Day. Possible solutions:

1. Give the date not the name, eg "Closed 25 Apr".
2. Give the name and the date, eg something like "Closed ANZAC Day (25 Apr)".
3. List holidays in the article for the appropriate level (eg national holidays in the country article, local holidays in the article for the state, county or whatever) and then use the name, eg "Closed ANZAC Day".

I think I prefer solution 3.

For holidays not occurring on a fixed date I don’t think there is any alternative to, for example, "Closed Good Friday". Nurg 18:42, 26 Dec 2003 (PST)

What about Thanksgiving? Canada and USA both celebrate it but on different dates. Countries using the Julian calendar for religious purposes may celebrate Good Friday on a different date than those using the Gregorian. As to Fat Tuesday, even many Anglophones would know that better by its French translation, and I have to translate it to recognize it; and I wouldn't know how to find it on a calendar. -phma 19:27, 26 Dec 2003 (PST)

I'd say solution 2 above is the obvious one to use as the default solution, because it is easiest to read. Solution three makes the traveller do more work in order to save editing effort or storage space, so I think it is wrong in most cases. The exception would be where it is a very common holiday; you don't need to give the date of ANZAC day in every Australia article. This then becomes a question of jdgement for the writer, but I'd say if in doubt, use pattern #2 above. Pashley 21:17, 9 May 2006 (EDT)

[edit] My comments

I'm glad this page has been started and I'm interested in seeing where it goes.

I don't have a big problem with going to am and pm versus AM and PM. My main concern is whether we should get in the habit of changing our preferred style on anything because the new style is marginally better than the old style.

Preferring one thing to another is fine, but by making something our standard, it means we're requiring ourselves to change any current content in that format. So, the advantages of any change should probably justify the work involved to change it.

I added a note on time zones. It should probably be obvious that times should be in the local time zone, but I made it explicit just in case. There are some cases where it might not be: The train leaves Paris each night at 9PM and arrives the next day in Lisbon at 4PM. Which time zone are the times in? I think most train and plane tickets use the local time on arrival and departure, but.

Also, it might be worthwhile to point out time range format. Like, "9-11am", "10am-4pm", "noon-midnight", "24 hours", whatever. --Evan 19:58, 26 Dec 2003 (PST)

I would specify both time zones if they are different: "The train leaves Paris each night at 9pm MET and arrives the next day in Lisbon at 4pm WET."

As an absolute time, midnight belongs to the following day, but some places, such as bars and pizzerias, open in the afternoon and close after the following midnight. So 5pm-3am Friday ends on Saturday. -phma 21:08, 26 Dec 2003 (PST)

[edit] Just curious

I'm not particularly opinionated about this, but why do we have to write "AM" and "PM" (or possibly "am" and "pm" if it gets changed) instead of "a.m." and "p.m.", which are the only accepted abbreviations in 3 dictionaries I consulted (Oxford Reference, Australian Concise Oxford and Collins Cobuild)? DhDh 13:29, 28 Dec 2003 (PST)

"am" vs. "a.m." vs. "AM" vs. "A.M." isn't particularly important. We went with "AM" to start off, and now there's some moves to use "am" instead. We can go through all 4 possibilities, as well as exploring some less obvious ones, like "ant. merid." or "M.A." or whatever.

We have suggestions as to why "am" would have been a better choice 6 months ago than "AM", and why "a.m." would have been better than both of them. What I haven't seen is a good reason why we should change from "AM" to either one of these right now. --Evan 08:21, 29 Dec 2003 (PST)

Use something that is easy on the eyes. AM is. am is sort of. a.m. isn't. Remember, we use these in short, crowded paragraphs about attractions etc. A point could be made to go with 24h format, since it is much easier esp. with noon/midnight. But since that would be opening up a whole string of arguments I'll ceede to the anglophiles on the point. Just don't make me use imperial units. Nils Jan 8th, 2004

Hey, thats not an anglophile issue; us Brits may be hopelessly backward on imperial units, but on the subject of 12/24h clocks we swing with the rest of Europe :-). Seriously I think most people who have enough english for wikitravel to be useful can in general handle either clock format. What I certainly cannot handle is 12am or 12pm; I have no idea what those mean and in general usage I will always use 'noon' and 'midnight' (or 00:00 and 12:00). I don't really care whether wikitravel stays 12h or goes 24h but I suggest we mandate 'noon' and 'midnight' if we stay 12h. --chris_j_wood May 14th, 2004

I think 24h time would solve this notation ( AM Vs am ) problem, along with noon and midnight. Looks like our signatures already use it so it would also add consistency. --Caffeine 16:30, 15 Mar 2004 (EST)

Another vote for 24h time format, with colon separator.

Should there be a link to this from Wikitravel:Manual of style#Formatting style?

The problem with 24 hour time is that a lot of people (i.e. travelers) find them confusing. Although I work in an organisation that uses a 24 hour clock, I note that many people are unable to convert between the two systems easily and are totally confused when confronted with a 24 hour time. While the people who are familiar with 24 hour time recognise the system, those who are not, won't. Using AM and PM is unambiguous. You just know it is 12 hour time. And so does everyone else. While I, personally, would happily accept 24 hour time, for clarity, I will instead plug for 12 hour time with AM and PM, NOON and MIDNIGHT as it is unambiguous and will nt be confusing or misunderstood.

As to whether it is AM, Am, am, a.m. or ante meridiem .... I do not think the dictionaries are necessarily the best guide. While a.m. might be the dictionary definition, it is only the consensus or popular way it is used. Dictionaries merely document the generally accepted way to use words, but word usage does change with writing style and usage. And when it does the definition in the dictionary will also change. I see that using AM (or PM) is the Wikitravel style and usage definition. In other words it is our way of doing things, like american spelling, we have chosen a particular path for some very good reasons. Some of those reason include clarity, ease of writing and viewing as well unambiguous meaning. I do not think many people will confuse AM for amplitude modulation when expressed in the context of opening hours.

For times that cross time-zones, either identify the time standard being used or state it is the local time of each destination. -- Huttite 05:30, 1 Dec 2005 (EST)

I reckon 24h is less confusing and would be surprised if that puts me in a minority. However, what's most confusing of all about 12h is that so many people frequently get it wrong when editing - "AM"s which should be "PM"s and vice-versa, and of course "12 AM" and "12 PM".

How about entering times in a format such as [12:34] and then a truly standard "style" being applied when the page is output?

I've seen mention of "skins" somewhere - couldn't people then have times displayed in their preferred format?

(apologies for poor descriptions - not familiar with the terminology)

[edit] AM vs a.m.

Reopening discussion, as the policy was just changed w/o discussion. Jonboy 11:56, 1 March 2006 (EST)

The most common method for listing ante meridiem or post meridiem used in written text is a.m. and p.m. The only time that AM or PM is used is on time tables on doors of stores. Style guides recommend a.m. and p.m. Times should be listed as: 12:30 a.m. format

Why should we make the effort to change? It doesn't seem even remotely worth it to me. --Evan 14:17, 1 March 2006 (EST)

Why not use whatever the majority of airlines use? -- anon

From a graphics design point-of-view, lowercase looks much much better. Enough to make it well worth the change. I prefer the version without the periods. -- Mark 01:55, 8 March 2006 (EST)

AM and PM are widely used, e.g. on signs as someone mentions above. The issue here is not design in the sense of how it looks, but design for clarity, easy recognition. I agree am and pm look better, but I'd say AM and PM are obviously correct. Pashley 05:44, 9 May 2006 (EDT)

I think the all-caps version looks ugly, and that the periods look even uglier. Count me as someone who'd like to change to 'am' and 'pm' -- if we can go to the effort of completely changing telephone number formats, we can certainly manage switching times over, particularly since so few attraction listings actually include a time. -- Colin 23:18, 9 May 2006 (EDT)

Despite my comment above, after looking at a few listings, I agree. am and pm are more readable. So I'd say we should use am and pm in North america and 24-hour clock (see discussion further on) everywhere else. However, Evan's question is a good one; it may not be worth the effort of changing. Pashley 08:31, 11 May 2006 (EDT)

Can we get some consensus on this particular question? My opinion is that lower case am or pm (without periods) looks far better than AM or PM - certainly much better than A.M. or P.M. Using capitals appears to make the times far less legible... Paul James Cowie 07:08, 26 May 2006 (EDT)

There is no "obviously correct" choice. I'm in favor of "am"/"pm", also for general readability. As for the burden of changing, usage is still pretty inconsistent in Wikitravel at this point, so I don't see a gradual transition as substantially more onerous than MoS-ing in general. - Todd VerBeek 07:33, 26 May 2006 (EDT)

[edit] Interesting (?) WikiPedia:24-hour_clock quote

"This system is the most commonly used time notation in the world of today. The United States is the only industrialized country left in which a substantial fraction of the population is not yet accustomed to it."

At the risk of opening a can of worms, I wouldn't be too averse to standardizing on the 24-hour clock elsewhere in the world (it's what all schedules etc use anyway, so even Yankees better get used to it) and letting the USA fester in its own legacy cesspool — we already do this for miles, Fahrenheit etc anyway. Jpatokal 21:54, 5 March 2006 (EST)

A quote from the Cambridge page [1] on the ISO Standard date format:

"The 24h time notation specified here has already been the de-facto standard all over the world in written language for decades. The only exception are a few English speaking countries, ...

"Please consider the 12h time to be a relic from the dark ages when Roman numerals were used, the number zero had not yet been invented and analog clocks were the only known form of displaying a time. Please avoid using it today, especially in technical applications! Even in the U.S., the widely respected Chicago Manual of Style now recommends using the international standard time notation in publications.

I'd say the 24-hour clock is definitely the way to go. Pashley 10:12, 9 May 2006 (EDT)

I'm fine with allowing 24 hour time in countries where schedules are routinely printed in 24 hour format. But I'd really like to keep am/pm for Norteamerica since a) it is the most common local format, b) most travelers to Norteamerica are Norteamerican and c) I assume international travelers still recall how to read analog clocks and are therefore familar with am/pm. -- Colin 23:15, 9 May 2006 (EDT)

So you're agreeing with Jpatokal above. I'm happy with that too. Sounds to me like we have a consensus. Anyone want to scream before I change the page? Pashley 08:16, 11 May 2006 (EDT)

Scream. I think it's a bad idea to change MoS pages for marginal advantages, especially when we have so many guides already started. Can you justify why changing from 12h to 24h is worth the time, effort, and disruption? I don't think it is. --Evan 09:11, 11 May 2006 (EDT)

No scream. I assume that in many existing guides with input from people outside the US, 24 hour time was used already, because those users (me included) didn't even know about the current style guide. Also, for most non-US Wikitravel visitors it's quite troublesome to convert the 12-hour AM/PM times to the usual 24-hour times. A guide should help, not create or add "problems". --Túrelio 14:56, 13 May 2006 (EDT)

SCREAM! I've been happily ignoring all rules with regard to dates and times. Additionally, I'm somewhat surprised that policy hasn't been changed since it seems we have a consensus with the exception of Evan's objection, which seems to stand on the objection that he was expecting a wholesale conversion of 2AM to 02:00 on every single guide. For the sake of compromise I suggest we adapt this as policy and no one go out of the way to change every single 2AM to 02:00. To further my arguments I trump The traveller comes first. I'm more than willing to wade in my "legacy cesspool" for the sake of everyone else in the world. -- Sapphire 03:48, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

Andrew: all I'm asking is for someone to say, "Yes, it's worth the trouble of changing every single guide to have 24 hour time." I don't think it's the case. Is 24-hour time so much better that it's worth the effort? Or is this just a run-around for Wikitravellers who could be spending their limited time on the site doing more important things?

I'm less interested in this particular case than in the general case. It's pretty important, when proposing a change to the MoS, to take into account the amount of effort it's going to take to change it. --Evan 16:07, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

Moved from Evan's talk page:

Also, I'm not very hell-bent on spelling out the days of the weeks, however, I am a strong believer in 24 hour format and I think converting to that format should be a route to explore. I originally hated the 24 hour format, but I changed my opinion of the format about two months ago. I'm very tempted to say that it would be worth the hassle. It's not as a daunting task as changing 10,000 articles since many (like Ajax) don't even have times or dates in the article. Also, it took us roughly four months to get rid of the "External Links" section. While I'm sure MoSing time formats will take a little longer than four months. I don't believe converting from AM/PM to 24 hours will distract too much from the and constructively contributing to Wikitravel, since I think most people will MoS the format as they just happen to notice the difference in formats on an article. -- Sapphire 16:53, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

I just want to make sure that people are a) thinking in terms of what's best for the project and for the traveler, not just of their own personal preferences, b) accepting that making MoS changes means changing a lot of articles, and c) not changing itsy-bitsy things on the MoS so often that its value as a reference becomes meaningless. --Evan 17:35, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

I understand those concerns and my personal preferences with regards to certain things have been developed over travelling and talking with travellers. When I send an email to a friend in Poland telling her the time I'll be arriving I always use "14:37" or whatever because it's the format she's familiar with and it leaves no doubt that she won't show up at 2 in the morning and I won't have to wait 12 hours. While in Warsaw I missed my train to Germany, because of my disregard for the 24 hour format. The woman in the ticket office tried to tell me the my train left at "8 PM", but since she wasn't very familiar with English I ended up missing my train since it actually left at 8 AM. It's somewhat easy to look over the "A" or "P" and confuse the times. -- 71.72.212.152 18:48, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

[edit] Days of the Week

alternative "Mon-Tue" format suggestion (compromise?):

Abbreviate to three letters, ie Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun

Note:

• Spell out when it is part of a named day, eg Good Friday, Fat Tuesday
• If it looks odd or ambiguous in a particular context, spell it out
• Spaces should be left out, eg "Mon-Fri" not "Mon - Fri" or "Mon thru Fri"
• For consistency/clarity, include the dash for consecutive pairs of days, eg "Sat-Sun" not "Sat Sun"
• When combining days with time, put the days first, eg Mon-Fri 10AM-2PM rather than 10AM-2PM Mon-Fri
• For all seven days, use "daily" - do not use "every day" or "Sun-Sat"

I like the three-letter forms for use in schedules, listings, etc. It makes easier reading than the shorter abbreviations. I'm a little amazed that the short ones were even proposed, let alone used. In running text, I see no reason to abbreviate at all. Use Monday, Tuesday, etc. because it is clearer. The traveller comes first so easy reading comes way ahead of saving bytes. Pashley 05:53, 9 May 2006 (EDT)

I agree with the use of three-letter forms. I also prefer the term "daily" to "every day". - Cybjorg 03:02, 16 May 2006 (EDT)

[edit] ISO Standard dates

There is an ISO standard (ISO 8601) for date formats [2] The date given above — 05:53, 9 May 2006 (EDT) — comes out in it as 2006-05-09 05:53 -5 I'd suggest we use 2006-05-09 05:53 utc-5, adding the "utc" makes it more readable. An important advantage is that this date format is the same across language versions, unlike month names. Adding "utc" does not cause a problem there in european languages. The standard uses the 24-hour clock. Pashley 09:45, 9 May 2006 (EDT)

[edit] Triple consensus?

My reading of the above is that we have consensus that three changes would be a good idea:

• use 24-hour clock except in North America
• replace "AM" with "am" when using 12-hour clock
• use three-letter abbreviations for days of the week, for easier reading

Am I wrong about the consensus on any of those?

What we don't have consensus on is that making any changes is worth the trouble. I'd agree with Todd's comment; we aren't all that consistent now so a gradual change is not going to be too burdensome. Anyone else want to comment? Pashley 10:05, 26 May 2006 (EDT)

Me too for all of the above. Jpatokal 11:02, 26 May 2006 (EDT)

No Change - Sorry, but I don't see the need to replace "AM" with "am" the advantage is marginal and all of the star articles would need to be changed and I am guessing, but likely most of the Guide articles would need change as well. And for that matter I don't really see the need to change anything in the standard. I would not be against the 24 hour clock, but the standard has been American English... Why vary in this standard? -- Tom Holland (xltel) 11:27, 26 May 2006 (EDT)

I disagree that having different time formats in different areas is preferable. I think that three-letter abbreviations will make the hours too long. I also disagree that making any of these changes is worth the effort. --Evan 17:29, 26 May 2006 (EDT)

Making the hours listings longer at the expense of making them readable (as opposed to "decryptible") is a sacrifice I'm OK with. "Sa Su" looks like the name of a German Linux distro, not a reference to the two days of the weekend. Frankly, 24-hour time - as sensible as it is - is similarly cryptic to those who haven't lived with it, and using different standards on different pages will just confuse the heck out of the majority of editors who simply (sort of) follow existing examples rather than reading the MoS page. -Todd VerBeek 17:44, 26 May 2006 (EDT)

[edit] Moved from Wikitravel:Listings

I'm I wrong that the Wiki folks want the date/time to be: Tu-F 2PM-5PM. Unizeppelin 03:07, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

[edit] Days of the week

I have no idea if I'm starting a new discussion or reviving an old one, but I'd really like the policy to require days of the week to be spelled out. I used to use abbreviated day names, but I've come to dislike abbreviated names for days. I believe policy tell us to use the minimum number of letters required to abbreviate a day's name for the sake of space, but that doesn't seem to be very 'professional.' (Maybe, it's personal preference.) Would anyone object to this change? -- Sapphire 03:31, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

Yes, I would. First, is this important enough to change every guide on the whole site? Only for your personal preference? Second, very short day names are the standard for most guidebooks. They take up a lot less space and visual room, and if you're leafing through a lot of listings, it's very easy to tell "W" from "Th". --Evan 16:13, 13 September 2006 (EDT)

[edit] 24 hour party people

What is our policy on how to display hours when a business is open around the clock? I was thinking just writing "24 hours," e.g.,

M-Th 9AM-2AM, F-Su 24 hours

Is this style write-up intelligible to non-US nationals? Is this the best way to do this? If so, I'll add it to the policy page. --Peter ^Talk 00:48, 8 November 2007 (EST)

Looks OK to me, and I've been doing more or less the same thing in Singapore (cf. The Balcony at [3]). Jpatokal 01:31, 8 November 2007 (EST)

[edit] International time formats

Our policy has been to always use the American time format (AM-PM), and policies can be hard to change, but I don't think it makes sense. When a country uses the 24 hour format, in my opinion we should also for the articles that cover that country. This is useful in a very basic way, since times will be displayed in 24 hour format and will not align to what we have written. I also really dislike the argument that we should use the American format to keep from confusing Americans. First, my country is a resilient nation and should be able to handle it; second, the argument can be applied in reverse to virtually the entire rest of the world. This would also match our (finally) updated spelling policy to use local spelling in articles (throughout the English speaking world).

So I propose we use local time formats. Changing this policy does not, as has been argued above, mean that we need to spend tons of time modifying all our articles for marginal benefit. It does, however, mean that we will not have to force star nominations for destinations outside the U.S. to fit a policy that does not make sense. Objections? Agreement? --Peter ^Talk 08:54, 3 September 2008 (EDT)

Just to clarify -- "local time format" means one of the two common options, right? We should also add the formatting rules for the two common options to the policy page. Given this, I support a change. -- Colin 11:06, 3 September 2008 (EDT)

Yes and agreed. --Peter ^Talk 11:55, 3 September 2008 (EDT)

Objection. Let me state up front that I am a personal proponent of 24-hour time and use it myself where possible. However, I do have a problem with the proposal as stated above. First, the "confusion" principle is not as reciprocal as claimed; I can't imagine users outside North America being confused by a 12-hour time format because that's precisely what analog clocks use. Unless the rest of the world has switched entirely to 24-hour digital clocks, a 12-hour format should be perfectly intelligible. (Unfortunately, 24-hour formats still require a majority of Americans to do some mental calculation -- myself included, although I can do it very quickly.) This is important because of my second point -- I feel we should be consistent in format. It's confusing to editors to have different standards based on the location of the article's subject. LtPowers 09:08, 6 October 2008 (EDT)

While it's true that Americans are going to have the most trouble with this, the problem is that they ARE going to have this trouble once they get to the country. Checkin times, train timetables, flight times and everything else will be printed in 24 hour time, and so it seems to me we would actually be helping the traveller by getting them to adjust to this difficulty sooner rather than later. -- Colin 16:06, 6 October 2008 (EDT)

True, so I wouldn't object to mandating 24-hour format throughout the site. I just don't like having different formats on the same site. LtPowers 19:56, 6 October 2008 (EDT)

As I see it, there are three issues here: 1) Time formats should match local timetables, 2) 24 hour time formats may confuse Americans, 3) Formatting should be as standard as possible.

Re: 1 & 2, I think #1 outweighs #2. While Americans might have trouble dealing with a foreign time format, they'll need to figure it out anyway to deal with local train schedules and posted opening/closing times. I think it's better that our formats match those of posted schedules in the location we're writing about.

3). I don't agree that it's always desirable to have standard formatting across the entire site. After all, we do use local spelling. In addition to the aforementioned benefit of alignment with local schedules, allowing local time formats means we won't have to reformat contributions from locals who are naturally using the format most familiar to them.

We've been pushing for more local formatting over the years, from highway designations, to phone number formats, to spelling. I see no reason to make this an exception. As long as the formatting differences would not apply to an area greater than that which would be covered by a single travel guidebook, I think we should be OK. --Peter ^Talk 15:10, 7 October 2008 (EDT)

FUCK! I've been spending so much time rewriting everything to AM/PM format, because i thought it was mandated here (someone sometime changed all my times to AM/PM format at one point). GRRRRR!!!! anyway - just a rant, never mind me, I would whole heatedly support not having to the work in the future, just a damn shame I have to go over the 200+ listings i changed in Copenhagen, all over again. Talking of that, is there any particular reason none has commented on my Copenhagen/Østerbro star nomination? Sertmann 18:22, 7 October 2008 (EDT)

No worries, this doesn't have to be a requirement. We can put in the policy that 24hr format for non-US destinations is preferred. In any rate, I don't see such a small issue holding up a star nomination. --Peter ^Talk 18:39, 7 October 2008 (EDT)

Oddly, I remember the "use American English" version of the Wikitravel:Spelling page, even though it was changed back in March. I hadn't realized that policy had changed. LtPowers 09:20, 8 October 2008 (EDT)