[Nhcoll-l] how should we encode vague dates in specimen database?

[Janet]

We have used the date convention yyyymmdd which is numeric and easily range searchable. Uncertainty can be accommodated using zeros, so March 1984 would be 19840300; 1984 with no further date is 19840000. More indefinite dates are harder to handle numerically. 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Sep 17, 2018, at 9:21 PM, Schultz, Eric <eric.schultz at uconn.edu> wrote:
> 
> We are cleaning up entries in a legacy database so that our data can be imported into a properly configured collections database.  Exact dates will be imported in a text string mm/dd/yyyy.  But how to render a vague date referring only to season, such as ‘Spring 1984’, or if only the year was recorded? Is it better to record as missing data, record as an erroneous but exact date such as 01/01/1984, or place at the midpoint of the season?  Whatever we do we will have a ‘verbatim’ field that preserves the original entry, but we want to have a version of collection date that is useful and searchable.  Thanks for any assistance!
>  
> Eric T. Schultz
> Professor, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
> Coordinator, Joint BS-MS Degree in Biodiversity and Conservation Biology
> Director, Vertebrate Biodiversity Collections
> Chair, General Education Oversight Committee
> University of Connecticut
> Storrs, CT 06269-3043
> eric.schultz at uconn.edu
> 860.486.4692
>  
>  
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