Change date format in Thunderbird
Pa
and Lightning.
I'm using Windows and I know that Thunderbird should use the system
default date format but it doesn't. I've tried changing the region or
setting the date format manually.
Currently Thunderbird uses mm/dd/yyyy 0:00 AM/PM but I want to change
it to dd.mm.yyyy 00:00. That's what I configured my system to.
Thunderbird seems to not care about the system settings and continues
to show the date in the same format.
Is there perhaps a possibility to set a custom format by changing one
of the .js files or something else?
Pa
Mike Easter
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Date_display_format Date display format
http://www.thunderbird-mail.de/wiki/ConfigDate_(English) Add-ons for
Thunderbird - Extensions - ConfigDate
--
Mike Easter
Pa
>> Is there perhaps a possibility to set a custom format by changing one
>> of the .js files or something else?
>
> http://kb.mozillazine.org/Date_display_format Date display format
>
> http://www.thunderbird-mail.de/wiki/ConfigDate_(English) Add-ons for
> Thunderbird - Extensions - ConfigDate
Thanks for you reply but that extension doesn't work for me.
It installs without problems and I can select my desired
date format but after a restart of TB, the date's format
still the same. I tried different combinations (short/long...)
but nothing changed.
I checked the mail.ui.display.dateformat.* settings but that
doesn't solve my problem, because TB itself suggest the wrong
format. All these settings or ConfigDate just let you choose
between the different TB date formats but don't actually let you
change them.
Pa
Mike Easter
> Mike Easter wrote:
>
>>> Is there perhaps a possibility to set a custom format by changing one
>>> of the .js files or something else?
>>
>> http://kb.mozillazine.org/Date_display_format Date display format
Part of the reason I posted that link is because it reiterates that the
display format is set by the operating system.
> Thanks for you reply but that extension doesn't work for me.
> It installs without problems and I can select my desired
> date format but after a restart of TB, the date's format
> still the same. I tried different combinations (short/long...)
> but nothing changed.
I suspect that there is something wrong with your XP setting.
> I checked the mail.ui.display.dateformat.* settings but that
> doesn't solve my problem, because TB itself suggest the wrong
> format. All these settings or ConfigDate just let you choose
> between the different TB date formats but don't actually let you
> change them.
The moz kb article talks about what Tbird allows you to configure and
what it doesn't.
It doesn't handle the yyyy/mm/dd (my choice) or the dd/mm/yyyy (your
choice). It handles some minor issues.
I am US. The default date format for Windows is mm/dd/yyyy and that is
the format that Tbird uses if I don't change it. But, I am pro-ISO
8601, so I want yyyy-mm-dd. If I change that properly in WinXP, that is
the format that Tbird uses in such views as the Date column in the view
of the headers for a newsgroup and the headers for a message I'm reading.
So, from my experience in this matter, I conclude that you have not
properly configured your XP, because I can change Tbird's format by
changing my XP format, so I have to conclude that you should be able to
similarly achieve your dd/mm/yyyy in Tbird by so configuring.
--
Mike Easter
Mike Easter
> I want yyyy-mm-dd. If I change that properly in WinXP, that is
> the format that Tbird uses
Incidentally; changing the date format in XP is very very easy.
Changing the date format in something like Ubuntu or Mint is very
difficult - or rather awkward because there isn't a similar graphical tool.
It wouldn't be so bad if there were just a little file somewhere that
you could find and change 'directly' from readable ascii, but
unfortunately the 'little file' wants its configuration spelled out in
Unicode format.
%m/%d/%Y = <U0025><U006D><U002F><U0025><U0064><U002F><U0025><U0059>
so %Y%m%d would become
<U0025><U0059><U002F><U0025><U0064><U002F><U0025><U006D>
Actually, that's not as bad as it looks, because you can just exchange
59 & 6D with each other.
--
Mike Easter
Joe Brown
Using XP, you need to go into the Control Panel then into Regional and
Language Options. Click on Customize then click on Date. This is the
only way I know of that you can accomplish this.
As Mike Easter pointed out this change is at the OS level.
Mike Easter
> %m/%d/%Y = <U0025><U006D><U002F><U0025><U0064><U002F><U0025><U0059>
>
> so %Y%m%d would become
> <U0025><U0059><U002F><U0025><U0064><U002F><U0025><U006D>
Wrong!
> Actually, that's not as bad as it looks, because you can just exchange
> 59 & 6D with each other.
Wrong again.
That makes %m/%d/%Y into %Y/%d/%m. I want %Y/%m/%d, so I should move
the %Y to the front and add a slash after it and drop the final slash
(or the equivalent of moving the final slash to in between the %Y and
the %m.
<U0025><U0059><U002F><U0025><U006D><U002F><U0025><U0064>
Back to my original premise; working with unicode is awkward because
you can't 'see' what you are doing.
--
Mike Easter
Traveller
And unfortunately, it does not seem to translate to TB. I have had my
date/time format set in XP the same way Pa wants to see it, but TB does
not reflect this preference. I suspect, having read the links posted
earlier, that TB is simply not able to display in what XP refers to as
(for me, at least) "English [Canadian]". It would be very nice if I
could see the dates formatted "correctly" and the times in 24 hour form,
but the information available suggests that TB lacks the appropriate
programming to achieve this. So much for i18n.
Dave
Ron Hunter
Just a thought. Have you rebooted after making the change? Some
changes require rebooting....
Ron K.
Dave, have you tries using the ConfigDate extension?
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/901/
--
Ron K.
Who is General Failure, and why is he searching my HDD?
Kernel Restore reported Major Error used BSOD to msg the enemy!
Traveller
I can't speak for the OP, but I have had my date/time set "Canadian"
since I got this box about 3 years ago. So, yes, I have rebooted more
than once (this is windoze, after all) :) From what I read in the
Mozilla pages posted earlier, it seems that TB simply lacks the
appropriate code to display in this format. I hope I'm wrong. It would
be nice to have a consistent format across all the programmes on my system!
Dave
Traveller
Thanks, Ron! That works a treat! No more translating!
Dave
Mike Easter
> So much for i18n.
Doh! I just now learned what i18n means. For some reason I was unaware
of the 'function' of 'numeronyms'.
When I was hunting down the linux file to fix, it was in a folder named
i18n which puzzled me because I wasn't familiar with the 'term', but I
didn't search for that string to see if there was an explanation.
Then when you said it (again), I decided to work on it - what it was.
Such numeronym is based on the 'substitution' of the short numeronym for
the long word which starts with an 'i' and ends with an 'n' and has 18
letters in between the two.
internationalization
Another such numeronym is L10n for localization using the capital L to
help distinguish them.
--
Mike Easter
Miles
Well, my XP,SP2 is set for English-US with short format dd-mmm-yy and
long format dddd,dd-mmmm.yyyy and that works fine in TB.
Mike Easter
> Well, my XP,SP2 is set for English-US with short format dd-mmm-yy and
> long format dddd,dd-mmmm.yyyy and that works fine in TB.
That's what I would expect. I see you are Tb 3.1
--
Mike Easter
Pa
>> Currently Thunderbird uses mm/dd/yyyy 0:00 AM/PM but I want to change
>> it to dd.mm.yyyy 00:00. That's what I configured my system to.
>
> Using XP, you need to go into the Control Panel then into Regional and
> Language Options. Click on Customize then click on Date. This is the
> only way I know of that you can accomplish this.
There is something seriously wrong with the way TB handles
system date format or it's Windows. I've tried some experiments
with changing my regional settings.
I changed my region (and therefore the date format) to
Germany (dd.mm.yyyy). Thunderbird now correctly displays that
format. Now I change only the date format to dd/mm.yyyy and
TB correctly reflects that change. So far, so good.
Now I change my region to Luxembourg (which I had been using before),
the Windows date format changes to dd/mm/yyyy (which is wrong,
Microsoft's research is apparently not that thorough). TB now
shows the date as mm/dd/yyyy (different from Windows). I tried Excel
and there it works, so Windows does save the setting. I change it
manually to something else and TB still doesn't see the change after
a restart.
I have two possible conclusions:
- Windows saves the settings for newer regions (that region didn't exist
in Windows versions before before XP SP3) at different locations
(registry?) and TB looks at the wrong one.
or
- Thunderbird doesn't recognize that region and just uses some default
date format (US/English).
A bug possibly?
Pa
Mike Easter
> There is something seriously wrong with the way TB handles
> system date format or it's Windows. I've tried some experiments
> with changing my regional settings.
That's good research. You should file a bug report.
> A bug possibly?
--
Mike Easter
Pa
> That's good research. You should file a bug report.
I found Bug 253883 and submitted my report. But like
most bugs I've searched for, it's been existing since
2004 and no one really cares.
Pa