eeStartDate (startdate)

In which input files is this field used?

In entries of DBI files

What should the field look like?

In the usual files (including w.dbi): [startdate:xxx]

What does the field contain?

The start date, in case a story is a sequence of newspaper strips.

This start date can differ from the original start date of the newspaper sequence, while the indexer still thinks this is not enough to use the changes field. The reason for this is that the "original" startdate and enddate are usually not clearly defined, but based on arbitrary choices.

Which checks are done?

The field always has the (international standard) format "yyyy-mm-dd".
If the day is unknown, the field has no "-dd" ("yyyy-mm"). If the month is unknown too, the date is simply a 4-digit year.

If only the quarter of the year is known, the date format is "yyyy-Qx" where x is 1, 2, 3, or 4. For instance "1998-Q3" = 3rd quarter of 1998.

A date field can be followed by a '?'.

If a date contains a letter 'y', 'm', or 'd', the rest of the date, starting with this letter, is ignored. This allows dates like "1978-mm-dd" and "1978-03-dd". (This feature was added to make the input more readable. Use it with care!)

Note that the full 4-digit year is mentioned in the date.

The checking on real dates is not done completely, for instance February 29th is allowed in all years.
Depending on the storycode, the date is checked: for Z-codes it should be a Sunday, while for Y-codes it should not be a Sunday.

Which CSV field(s) use this field?

The field startdate in table inducks_entry

This page was generated on 2006-11-08 by DVEGEN 4.3 © Harry Fluks 2003.
For more information contact Harry Fluks (hfl at inducks.org - replace the at)