I was all set this morning to do a long rant on why we should be using this date format:

2007/05/22 (or 2007-05-22 in situations where the “/” is inappropriate)

Looks a little weird, I know, but no matter what culture you’re from, there’s no doubt what date that refers to. I didn’t even have to tell you that it’s YYYY/MM/DD–because what else could it be? My personal reason for adopting this format over 10 years ago was that it sorts well in plain-text data–like in the file system on a computer. It continues to sort well even when followed by a similarly-standardized time (like 16:22:03).

Anyway, the reason I don’t have to do a long(er) rant is that a fast Google Search reveals a lot of other people thinking about this:

• ISO has a standard for it (note that ISO is a for-profit enterprise, so you can’t actually see the standard unless you pay)
• W3C embraces it
• There are at least 11 reasons to use it, and they’re all good ones

And perhaps the most solid recommendation in the modern era, and what got me thinking about this today: Google uses it. It’s right there at the bottom of the Gmail advanced search options.

And if Google does it, it’s got to be good, right?