GNU bug report logs - #61528
date doesn't parse negative years

Previous Next

Package: coreutils;

Reported by: Richard Neill <rn214 <at> richardneill.org>

Date: Wed, 15 Feb 2023 08:12:01 UTC

Severity: normal

To reply to this bug, email your comments to 61528 AT debbugs.gnu.org.

Toggle the display of automated, internal messages from the tracker.

View this report as an mbox folder, status mbox, maintainer mbox


Report forwarded to bug-coreutils <at> gnu.org:
bug#61528; Package coreutils. (Wed, 15 Feb 2023 08:12:01 GMT) Full text and rfc822 format available.

Acknowledgement sent to Richard Neill <rn214 <at> richardneill.org>:
New bug report received and forwarded. Copy sent to bug-coreutils <at> gnu.org. (Wed, 15 Feb 2023 08:12:01 GMT) Full text and rfc822 format available.

Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Richard Neill <rn214 <at> richardneill.org>
To: bug-coreutils <at> gnu.org
Subject: date doesn't parse negative years
Date: Wed, 15 Feb 2023 04:31:45 +0000
Hello,

I noticed that date doesn't accept negative years, such as in the date:
 -0001-01-02  (i.e. 2nd Jan 2 BC).

It's also somewhat puzzling that even through date will convert a 
timestamp in that year to an output string, it won't parse that string 
as valid (i.e. the last 2 lines below).

date +%Y-%m-%d -d '0001-01-02'   -> 0001-01-02
date +%Y-%m-%d -d '0000-01-02'   -> 0000-01-02
date +%Y-%m-%d -d '-0001-01-02'  -> date: invalid date ‘-0001-01-02’
date +%Y-%m-%d -d @-62135510325  -> 0001-01-02
date +%Y-%m-%d -d @-62167132725  -> 0000-01-02
date +%Y-%m-%d -d @-62198668725  -> -001-01-02
date +%Y-%m-%d -d '-001-01-02'   -> date: invalid date ‘-001-01-02’


My reading of ISO_8601 is that these are allowed in formats  YYYY-MM-DD 
where YYYY is a 4-6 digit number which may be positive, zero or 
negative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601

Note that we should treat  year 0 is also 1 BC, while -1 AD is 2 BC.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_zero

Thanks very much.

P.S. cal doesn't work with years 0 and below either.




This bug report was last modified 1 year and 264 days ago.

Previous Next


GNU bug tracking system
Copyright (C) 1999 Darren O. Benham, 1997,2003 nCipher Corporation Ltd, 1994-97 Ian Jackson.