DateTime Format - Review and make recommendation about adopting Microsoft's guidance on DateTime formatting

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Parent Issue: #2463

Storage is adopting Microsoft's guidance on DateTime formatting. Please review Microsoft's guidance and make recommendation for whether or not the HPE Design System should also adapt this guidance.

ToDos:

• Review "background" provided on DateTime Formatting & Guidance #2463
• Review Microsoft's DateTime formatting guidance.
• Make recommendation on aspects HPE Design System should/should not adopt.

Deliverable:

• Share-out with team either in Show & Tell or in dedicated session.
• Recommendation documented in comment in this issue. Link to comment from here: Recommendation.

[KennyAtHPE]

6/20 Update:

Have been preoccupied with support for ASP and intern planning/onboarding. Will add my rec and next steps for this ticket EOD soon and send it out to the team for review.

[KennyAtHPE]

After reviewing:

• Microsoft's DateTime formatting guidance
• Storage's proposal
• Atlassian
• Medium articles
• Collins Dictionary
• International System of Units (SI)

My recommendation on how to abbreviate units of time:

• Second, Seconds - sec
• Minute, Minutes - min
• Hour, Hours - hr
• Day, Days - day, days
• Week, Weeks - wk
• Month, Months - mo
• Year, Years - yr

Qs from Storage and rationale:

• Should we show plural vs singular? Ex. secs, mins, hrs, days, wks, mos, yrs
  - Do not use plurals for abbreviations. Days can and should be used since it is not abbreviated.

• Adopt Microsoft UI rules for abbreviation, but instead use “hr” for hours and “day or days”?

  • Yes, these should be used since they are clear to users and fitting for HPE use cases.
  • Keep all abbreviations consistent to 2-3 letters
  • Using these longer abbreviations could help eliminate confusion in use cases where DateTime abbreviations may appear alongside other abbreviations.
  • It is clearer to read and quicker to digest: ex.12 days 4 hr ago vs. 12 d 4 h ago

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Next steps:

• Review the international browser APIs
  • https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Intl/RelativeTimeFormat
  • https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Intl/DateTimeFormat
  • https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Intl
• Create a DateTime Format page in the Foundation section on the DS site
• Explore and include within the new page:
  • Use cases + examples on when/when not to use these abbreviations
  • Zero padding within dates
  • Locale-specific formatting

Follow up ticket