RE: Serial Date formula -- MIDRANGE-L

Ron, Doug:

If Chris is expecting dates between 01/01/1900 and 02/28/1900, the correct
serial date can be calculated by using option 1 and then subtracting 1 more
day for this exception.

I have to admit it's a little scary for a package, as comprehensive and
widely-used as Excel, to have such a basic bug in it.  I wonder how a bug
like this persists for so long?  (Presuming it wasn't just introduced in
Excel 2000, the version I used.)

I just read Doug Handy's explanation that the bug is a "feature" to maintain
backward compatibility !  I guess that's why a negative DATEVALUE translates
to "#######" while a DATEVALUE of 0 translates to 1/0/1900 !

jt


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-midrange-l@midrange.com
[mailto:owner-midrange-l@midrange.com]On Behalf Of Falconberry, Ron
Sent: Friday, April 13, 2001 11:10 AM
To: 'MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com'
Subject: RE: Serial Date formula


So, since Excel recognizes 02/29/1900 as valid, but the AS/400 does not, it
would appear that there are two answers to the  original writer's question
about obtaining a date value for 03/18/2001:

1. If he wants to match the Excel value of 36968, he needs to use 12/30/1899
as the base date in his SUBDUR statement.  Any date value greater than
02/28/1900 would produce the identical value as Excel.

2. If he wants an accurate date value, use 12/31/1899 as the base date in
his SUBDUR statement.  Excel and the AS/400 will match for the first 59 days
of 1900 but, after that, they will be off by a day.

Is anyone else concerned, like me, that if Excel can be off on a simple date
calculation, what other errors might be hidden in that, or other MS,
packages?

Ron




-----Original Message-----
From: jt [mailto:jt@ee.net]
Sent: Friday, April 13, 2001 8:56 AM
To: MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com
Subject: RE: Serial Date formula


Since Excel uses 1900-01-01 as day 1, the base date (or seed date) should be
1899-12-31.  But the base date actually calculates to 1899-12-30.

Well, I'll be darned !  The Excel serial date for 1901-01-01 is 367.  The
date for DATEVALUE(60) is 1900-02-29.

Excel calculates the year 1900 to be a leap year which, as Leif pointed out,
it isn't.

jt



-----Original Message-----
From: owner-midrange-l@midrange.com
[mailto:owner-midrange-l@midrange.com]On Behalf Of DeLong, Eric
Sent: Thursday, April 12, 2001 4:51 PM
To: 'MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com'
Subject: RE: Serial Date formula


Chris,

It almost looks like a form of julian date based on 1900-01-01, but it
appears to be a couple of days off. In RPGIV, you could use SUBDUR and a
constant date value of 1899-12-30 to calculate this goofy julian. Of course
you want to specify the result in *D (days).

hth,
Eric DeLong



-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Beck [mailto:CBeck@good-sam.com]
Sent: Thursday, April 12, 2001 3:13 PM
To: MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com
Subject: Serial Date formula


Can someone tell the formula to convert 20010318  to 36968.

This would be just like the DATEVALUE in Excel.

Thanks
Chris


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