Date Intervals, Formats, and Functions


Summary of Interval Types

The interval types are summarized as follows:

YEAR

specifies yearly intervals. Abbreviations are YEAR, YEARS, YEARLY, YR, ANNUAL, ANNUALLY, and ANNUALS. The starting subperiod s is in months (MONTH ).

YEARV

specifies ISO 8601 yearly intervals. The ISO 8601 year starts on the Monday on or immediately preceding January 4th. Note that it is possible for the ISO 8601 year to start in December of the preceding year. Also, some ISO 8601 years contain a leap week. For further discussion of ISO weeks, see Technical Committee ISO/TC 154 (Processes, Data Elements, and Documents in Commerce, Industry, and Administration) (2004). The starting subperiod s is in ISO 8601 weeks (WEEKV ).

R445YR

is the same as YEARV except that the starting subperiod s is in retail 4-4-5 months (R445MON ).

R454YR

is the same as YEARV except that the starting subperiod s is in retail 4-5-4 months (R454MON ). For a discussion of the retail 4-5-4 calendar, see National Retail Federation (2007).

R544YR

is the same as YEARV except that the starting subperiod s is in retail 5-4-4 months (R544MON ).

SEMIYEAR

specifies semiannual intervals (every six months). Abbreviations are SEMIYEAR, SEMIYEARS, SEMIYEARLY, SEMIYR, SEMIANNUAL, and SEMIANN.

The starting subperiod s is in months (MONTH ). For example, SEMIYEAR.3 intervals are March–August and September–February.

QTR

specifies quarterly intervals (every three months). Abbreviations are QTR, QUARTER, QUARTERS, QUARTERLY, QTRLY, and QTRS. The starting subperiod s is in months (MONTH ).

R445QTR

specifies retail 4-4-5 quarterly intervals (every 13 ISO 8601 weeks). Some fourth quarters contain a leap week. The starting subperiod s is in retail 4-4-5 months (R445MON ).

R454QTR

specifies retail 4-5-4 quarterly intervals (every 13 ISO 8601 weeks). Some fourth quarters contain a leap week. For a discussion of the retail 4-5-4 calendar, see National Retail Federation (2007). The starting subperiod s is in retail 4-5-4 months (R454MON ).

R544QTR

specifies retail 5-4-4 quarterly intervals (every 13 ISO 8601 weeks). Some fourth quarters contain a leap week. The starting subperiod s is in retail 5-4-4 months (R544MON ).

MONTH

specifies monthly intervals. Abbreviations are MONTH, MONTHS, MONTHLY, and MON. The starting subperiod s is in months (MONTH). For example, MONTH2.2 intervals are February–March, April–May, June–July, August–September, October–November, and December–January of the following year.

R445MON

specifies retail 4-4-5 monthly intervals. The 3rd, 6th, 9th, and 12th months are five ISO 8601 weeks long with the exception that some 12th months contain leap weeks. All other months are four ISO 8601 weeks long. R445MON intervals begin with the 1st, 5th, 9th, 14th, 18th, 22nd, 27th, 31st, 35th, 40th, 44th, and 48th weeks of the ISO year. The starting subperiod s is in retail 4-4-5 months (R445MON ).

R454MON

specifies retail 4-5-4 monthly intervals. The 2nd, 5th, 8th, and 11th months are five ISO 8601 weeks long. All other months are four ISO 8601 weeks long with the exception that some 12th months contain leap weeks. R454MON intervals begin with the 1st, 5th, 10th, 14th, 18th, 23rd, 27th, 31st, 36th, 40th, 44th, and 49th weeks of the ISO year. For a discussion of the retail 4-5-4 calendar, see National Retail Federation (2007). The starting subperiod s is in retail 4-5-4 months (R454MON ).

R544MON

specifies retail 5-4-4 monthly intervals. The 1st, 4th, 7th, and 10th months are five ISO 8601 weeks long. All other months are four ISO 8601 weeks long with the exception that some 12th months contain leap weeks. R544MON intervals begin with the 1st, 6th, 10th, 14th, 19th, 23rd, 27th, 32nd, 36th, 40th, 45th, and 49th weeks of the ISO year. The starting subperiod s is in retail 5-4-4 months (R544MON ).

SEMIMONTH

specifies semimonthly intervals. SEMIMONTH breaks each month into two periods, starting on the 1st and 16th days. Abbreviations are SEMIMONTH, SEMIMONTHS, SEMIMONTHLY, and SEMIMON. The starting subperiod s is in SEMIMONTH periods. For example, SEMIMONTH2.2 specifies intervals from the 16th of one month through the 15th of the next month.

TENDAY

specifies 10-day intervals. TENDAY breaks the month into three periods, the 1st through the 10th day of the month, the 11th through the 20th day of the month, and the remainder of the month. (TENDAY is a special interval typically used for reporting automobile sales data.) The starting subperiod s is in TENDAY periods. For example, TENDAY4.2 defines 40-day periods that start at the second TENDAY period.

WEEK

specifies weekly intervals of seven days. Abbreviations are WEEK, WEEKS, and WEEKLY. The starting subperiod s is in days (DAY ), with the days of the week numbered as 1=Sunday, 2=Monday, 3=Tuesday, 4=Wednesday, 5=Thursday, 6=Friday, and 7=Saturday. For example, WEEK.7 means weekly with Saturday as the first day of the week.

WEEKV

specifies ISO 8601 weekly intervals of seven days. Each week starts on Monday. The starting subperiod s is in days (DAY ). Note that WEEKV differs from WEEK in that WEEKV.1 starts on Monday, WEEKV.2 starts on Tuesday, and so forth.

WEEKDAY
WEEKDAYdW
WEEKDAYddW
WEEKDAYdddW

specifies daily intervals with weekend days included in the preceding weekday. Note that for a five-day work week that starts on Monday, the appropriate interval is WEEKDAY5.2. Abbreviations are WEEKDAY and WEEKDAYS. The starting subperiod s is in weekdays (WEEKDAY).

The WEEKDAY interval is the same as DAY except that weekend days are absorbed into the preceding weekday. Thus, there are five WEEKDAY intervals in a calendar week: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and the three-day period Friday-Saturday-Sunday.

The default weekend days are Saturday and Sunday, but any one to six weekend days can be listed after the WEEKDAY string and followed by a W. Weekend days are specified as '1' for Sunday, '2' for Monday, and so forth. For example, WEEKDAY67W specifies a Friday-Saturday weekend. WEEKDAY1W specifies a six-day work week with a Sunday weekend. WEEKDAY17W is the same as WEEKDAY.

DAY

specifies daily intervals. Abbreviations are DAY, DAYS, and DAILY. The starting subperiod s is in days (DAY).

HOUR

specifies hourly intervals. Aliases are HOUR, DTHOUR, HOURS, DTHOURS, HOURLY, DTHOURLY, HR, and DTHR. The starting subperiod s is in hours (HOUR).

MINUTE

specifies minute intervals. Aliases are MINUTE, DTMINUTE, MINUTES, DTMINUTES, MIN, and DTMIN. The starting subperiod s is in minutes (MINUTE).

SECOND

specifies second intervals. Aliases are SECOND, DTSECOND, SECONDS, DTSECONDS, SEC and DTSEC. The starting subperiod s is in seconds (SECOND).