Question and Answer Database
FAQ4238C.txt :Date Field Precision For Borland Database Formats
Category :Database Issues
Platform :All Windows
Product :C++Builder1.0, C++Builder3.x,
Question:
What is the Date Field precision for Borland database
formats?
Answer:
Date Field Precision for Paradox, Visual dBASE and
InterBase are as follows:
Paradox
Date Field Range is from January 1, 9999 BC to December
31, 9999 AD. Paradox correctly handles leap years and
leap centuries and checks all dates for validity.
Paradox treats all BC years as leap years.
dBase
In dBASE III+ to Visual dBASE for Windows 5.5
Date Field Range is from January 1, 0000 to December
31, 9999. For all versions of dBASE from version III+
to the current Visual dBASE for Windows 5.5, date
fields are stored as a string in the format YYYYMMDD.
In dBASE III+ a new SET CENTURY command was added for
the approaching 21st century. SET CENTURY ON allows
display and editing of the 4 digit year. SET CENTURY
OFF limits display and entry of the year to 2 digits.
All calculations and storage involving date fields
handle the year correctly regardless of the state of
SET CENTURY. With SET CENTURY OFF, the command, STORE
{01/01/2000} TO MYDATE, will display the year as 00
even though it is stored correctly on disk and in
memory as the string 20000101. Note that the YEAR
function always returns a 4 digit year.
InterBase
Date Field Range is from January 1, 100 to December
11, 5941. InterBase supports a DATE data type that
stores dates as two 32-bit longwords. An InterBase
DATE data type includes information about year,
month, day of the month, and time.
12/16/1998 12:14:28 PM
Last Modified: 01-SEP-99