4 ms·

04-06-2014 is the 4th of June. 06-04-2014 is the 6th of April. I can get this right every time without learning every date parrot fashion, so there must be a w

• dragonwriter 12y ago
  Largest->smallest is the order the digits in the components are written in, so doing the larger structure the same way as the smaller components is more consistent. yyyy-mm-dd is only more unambiguous (as opposed to internally consistent) than either dd-mm-yyyy or mm-dd-yyyy because there is no other common 4-2-2 digit combination, while both of 2-2-4 digit combinations are common enough that ambiguity, especially with an international audience, is certain. yyyy-MMM-dd (with month name or name abbreviations) is probably the least ambiguous (even slightly better than ISO 8601 on that point), but its also language-dependent, which is a big downside, and doesn't sort well as a string (which is a downside in automated applications, though perhaps not as much for human reading). ISO 8601 isn't perfect, its just better than most of the alternatives and adopted as an international standard.
• psychometry 12y ago
  You "get it right" because that's the only format you see wherever you're from. It reality, it's impossible tell without context, which is why both are inferior formats. yyyy-mm-dd has the additional benefit of being sortable as text, so it's better than dd-mm-yyyy even if you ignore the obvious ambiguity.