Center for International Earth Science Information Network
9. Time Period
Time Period contains details about the date and time of an event
and provides a means of stating temporal information. As such, Time
Period is used by multiple sections of these metadata guidelines.
This section contains definitions, formats, and examples for the following metadata elements:
Single Calendar Date/Time
Definition: A means of encoding a single date and time. Includes the year (and optionally the month, or month and day), followed by the hour (and optionally the minute, or minute and second).
Format: yyyy-mm-dd/hh:mm:ss (year-month-day/ hour:minutes:seconds)
Example:
Single Calendar Date/Time: 1996-07-24/14:02:09
Single Calendar Date/Time: 1997-01-21
Single Range of Dates/Times
Definition: A means of encoding a range of dates and times. Includes the "beginning date and time" e.g. the year (and optionally the month, or month and day) followed by the hour (and optionally the minute, or minute and second); and the "ending date and time" using the same notation as above.
Format: yyyy-mm-dd/hh:mm:ss/yyyy-mm-dd/hh:mm:ss (year-month-day/hour:minutes:seconds)
Example:
Single Range of Dates/Times: 1996-10-24/13:20:04/1996-12-13/10:27:14
Single Range of Dates/Times: 1995-01-01/1995-12-31
Multiple Range of Dates/Times
Definition: A means of encoding more that one range of dates and times. Each range of dates and times listed includes a "beginning date and time" e.g. the year (and optionally the month, or month and day) followed by the hour (and optionally the minute, or minute and second); and the "ending date and time" using the same notation as above.
Format: yyyy-mm-dd/hh:mm:ss/yyyy-mm-dd/hh:mm:ss (year-month-day/hour:minutes:seconds)
Example:
Multiple Range of Dates/Times:1995-01-01/1995-12-31
1996-01-01/1996-12-31
1997-10-01/
Multiple Range of Dates/Times:1980/1985
1990/1994