Authoring information field description is weak [#370276]

A client just turned to me and asked "UK or US dates?" after I'd pointed him to the Authoring Information widget on a node form.

Rightly so; the information there is ambiguous!

Authored on:
*Field here*
Format: 2009-02-02 16:39:49 +0000. Leave blank to use the time of form submission.

It's not clear if this is YYYY-MM-DD or YYYY-DD-MM (despite most of us being aware that is the former, by default). In any case, it simply isn't clear full stop, to most people.

Is there a way we can "friendly this up" a bit? For starters, let's explain what +0000 is and define the actual date format.

Comment	File	Size	Author
#3	jamesan_370276.patch	1.08 KB	JamesAn

Comments

Comment #1

ultimateboy commented 12 February 2009 at 07:53

Title:	(Usability) Authoring information guidance is weak.	» Authoring information field description is weak
Issue tags:		+Usability

Comment #2

karschsp commented 17 March 2009 at 03:45

Issue tags:

+Novice

tagging for novice queue

Comment #3

JamesAn commented 31 March 2009 at 21:26

Status:

Active

» Needs review

Status	File	Size
new	jamesan_370276.patch	1.08 KB

I've modified the description string to the following:
Format: 2009-03-31 17:21:49 -0400. The date format is YYYY-MM-DD and -0400 is the timezone offset from UTC. Leave blank to use the time of form submission.

It's more detailed, but not too verbose.