Dates before 1900?

[#1]

I've created a form on which I need to allow users to enter dates before 1/1/1900. LiveCycle uses 1 Jan 1900 as its starting, or epoch date, so any date before that is considered to be invalid. I can avoid that problem by simply not supplying a validation pattern, but I also need to reformat the date to a specific format for display, which LiveCycle will not do because the date is invalid.



I'm just wondering if anyone has dealt with this before? I assume that I can use a text field instead and do all of the date validation and reformatting myself, but that seems like a lot or work.

[pguerett]

Are you refering to the calendar or the actual field itself. I was able to enter in a date like 10/10/1867 with an issue. Using the calendar on the other hand I was able to select the date but it never diaplyed in the field.

[#3]

I'm referring to a datetime field. You can enter anything, but if LiveCycle doesn't consider it to be valid, it won't use the display format for it. For example, I have a display format of d-mmm-yyyy. For dates after 1/1/1900, they are displayed correctly. Dates before 1/1/1900 are left as entered.

[pguerett]

Just checked on it and you are correct. There is a limitation of Jan 1, 1900. I suggest that you do not use a dat/time field but a standard text field and treat it as a string.

[#5]

Thanks for verifying my original statement. What I was looking for was perhaps someone who had already implemented a text-based solution.



My problem is that the users will enter the date as m/d/yyyy, but I have to format it as d-mmm-yyyy for display and printing, as well as validate it (at least as to valid month number and day within the month and year within a specific range). To do this with a text field will require considerable scripting, especially since the date will need to be set back to m/d/yyyy format if the user edits it. My field is also tied to a field in an XML file, but I don't believe that will cause any significant problems.



I will tackle the problems with using a text field and post any re-usable scripts that I come up.