You can specify absolute date and time templates by entering an example date that indicates exactly how you want each date and time element to be displayed or entered. You can specify any one of many variations of the following representative date and time for your date template:

Sunday, 1901 February 3 at 4:05:06 p.m.

You can use any or all parts of the representative date in your date template, as in the following examples:

An absolute date and time template overrides any date format specified by the II_DATE_FORMAT environment variable/logical. For more information on II_DATE_FORMAT, see the System Administrator Guide for the system on which your database resides.

You can use the following representations of components in a date and time template, with the exceptions noted in the table that follows:

This is easy to remember because Sunday is the first day of the week, and arguments 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 are the year, month, day, hour, minute, and second, respectively.

The following rules apply when using the representative date components to indicate position and style:

Ingres displays as a string constant any word you include in a date template other than the month name of February (or its allowed abbreviations), the weekday of Sunday (or its allowed abbreviations), and the time designation p or p.m.

You can combine any of the values given to specify your template, but be aware that some combinations of those values can lead to incorrect outputs. For example, you can display the numeric day of the year by specifying the day and year but leaving out the month. Therefore, 3/1901 in the template results in dates like 9/1998 for January 9, 1998, and 121/1998 for April 30, 1998. Also note that you can display just the numeric representation for month and year by leaving out the day-year and day-month. This results in outputs such as 3 for March 6, 1998, when specifying the template 02, and 98 for April 4, 1998, when specifying the template 01. However, when you use templates with 03, leaving out the month and the year, the template does not return the day of the month; instead, it returns the number of days since January 1, 1582 (Gregorian calendar), which leads to outputs like 151943 for February 1, 1998.

Numbers requiring more than one digit use up preceding blanks or zeroes. If there are no preceding blanks or zeroes left, the number expands to the right. A succeeding number does not use up a single blank immediately following a letter, word, or number. Columns of numbers can be lined up by preceding them with an appropriate number of blanks or zeroes.

Because full month and weekday names (as well as numbers without preceding blanks or zeros) are of differing lengths, date columns using these components in the format do not usually line up when displayed in columns. Follow February or Sunday with a vertical bar (|) to specify that for shorter month names or weekdays, an appropriate number of blanks is substituted for the vertical bar to line up the components. When you follow a single digit in your template with a vertical bar, each single‑digit entry is automatically preceded with a space, to line up single and double‑digit entries.

For example, the template Sunday,| February | 3,| 1901 produces dates like:

Any character preceded by a backslash (\) is printed as it appears.

The following table demonstrates the use of absolute date and time templates:

With input masking turned on, the only valid date template is the absolute date and time template. Input masking does not allow you to use date interval templates. Other restrictions apply, as discussed in Absolute Date and Time Templates.

There must be adequate room in the date input template for all the digits required by the template. For example, you must provide enough space to enter both single‑digit and double‑digit days of the month.

To use single digits for the day, month, or year in your input template, you must do either of the following:

For example, assume that you specify a format representing the month/day/year with no leading blanks or zeros in front of the digits:

If you turn input masking on, this template is unacceptable because all of the entries can be at least two digits (00/00/00 or 00/00/0000) and the preceding format only allows for the one digit in each part. To specify a format in this manner that is acceptable when input masking is on, you can precede each single digit with a space (d' 2/ 3/ 1') or with a zero (d'02/03/01'). Specifying d' 2/ 3/ 1' causes a blank‑filled date to display in the field prior to user entry; specifying '02/03/01' displays a zero‑filled date prior to user entry.

If you specify a template that is incorrect for use with input masking and turn on input masking, the template is used, if it is otherwise correct, without activating input masking. It does not generate an error message. However, it can compare the entered data to the template only when the user attempts to exit the field. If you correct the template, and input masking is still on, input masking is automatically activated or the next data entered.

You must enter data from left to right in a date field that has input masking turned on. Only numbers in the numeric portions of the template and alphabetic characters in the non‑numeric portions (month and day names) are accepted. If you try to enter an incorrect keystroke in a position, you hear a beep and the keystroke is not entered. The entire date and time string is validated only when you exit the field.