The idea might sound good, but the moment localization comes in, you learn that you'd much rather specify your date value in a template with some function like

The idea might sound good, but the moment localization comes in, you learn that you'd much rather specify your date value in a template with some function like date_for('de_CH', SHORT, some_date_value) and be done with it. In Switzerland alone, we have three ways (or four, depending on who you ask) to specify and format a date. Heck, we can't even agree whether the decimal point of numbers should be a period (de_CH) or a comma (fr_CH)