Localization: Do all locales put the weekday before the date?

Question

Here's a simple (hopefully) L10N question:

Do all locales want this format:

Sunday, Nov 23, 2008

with the weekday before the date, or do some locales want it after the date like this?

Nov 23, 2008, Sunday

Answer 1

I can't answer for all locales, but in French, we say "dimanche 23 novembre 2008", so for us, the answer is yes.

Now, I don't know your purpose, but you probably shouldn't make any guess like that anyway...

[EDIT] Funnily, I found an example in analyzing how the zh_TW locale is setting the date/time formats in Java 1.4. I found the format for this locale to be (after decompiling it):

"ahh'\u6642'mm'\u5206'ss'\u79D2' z", 
"ahh'\u6642'mm'\u5206'ss'\u79D2'", 
"a hh:mm:ss", 
"a h:mm", 
"yyyy'\u5E74'M'\u6708'd'\u65E5' EEEE", 
"yyyy'\u5E74'M'\u6708'd'\u65E5'", 
"yyyy/M/d", 
"yyyy/M/d", 
"{1} {0}"

while default, for US (found on the Net), is:

"h:mm:ss a z", // full time pattern
"h:mm:ss a z", // long time pattern
"h:mm:ss a", // medium time pattern
"h:mm a", // short time pattern
"EEEE, MMMM d, yyyy", // full date pattern
"MMMM d, yyyy", // long date pattern
"MMM d, yyyy", // medium date pattern
"M/d/yy", // short date pattern
"{1} {0}" // date-time pattern

See the full date pattern, the EEEE (day in week) is at the end for Taiwan...

Answer 2

Don't assume that.

I can customize my setting in XP to : T. MMMM JJJJ,TTTTT , which is: 24. November 2008,Montag

Yes. This is not per default, but I can set this in my regional settings!

Answer 3

No. For example, the Japanese use the order year-month-day-weekday.