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I thought this would be fixed by release time (especially given Ubuntu isn't based in the US) but it doesn't seem to be.

Am I missing something really simple or can I not set the date format to anything but US format? By that I mean if I click the notifications area the calendar shows the month first rather than second, e.g. "October 20" instead of "20th of October". The same is true for the lock screen and if I set the top bar to show the date using the Gnome tweak tool.

I've updated the format in the "Language" and "Formats" sections in "Region and Language". As far as I can tell that's the only place to update. I've also rebooted.

Is this a bug or by design? Or is it a limitation of Gnome or something?

Update: ok I probably should have tried this before posting but it never made a difference on 16.04.3. If I set the format to UK it does show the correct format in the notifications and lock screen but not on the top bar with the tweak tool. So going by that if feels like a bug. Does anyone have anything else to add? When I get a chance I'll see if I can file a bug and then update again.

Update 2: Translations have been approved. https://translations.launchpad.net/ubuntu/artful/+source/gnome-shell/+pots/gnome-shell/en_AU/+translate?batch=10&show=all&search=%25b

Michael Vescovo
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  • the US format relates to mm/dd/yy , but I don't see it relating to date which is given in full-text and obvious. the code needed to change that in various places (eg. gdm for login/lock, elsewhere for notifications..) adds to memory requirements, maintenance cost, and increases chance of bugs. the Ubuntu team have largely removed their 'fixes' using upstream glib/gtk+ (ie. upstream gnome) more than in the past. [this is opinion only; I'm no dev.] – guiverc Oct 19 '17 at 22:55
  • Anywhere the date is displayed it should be set using the correct format. That is the purpose of having a format setting. Unless they specifically want to display it in that format for some reason then it's a bug. But given the UK format is correct it seems like it's not by design and therefor a bug. – Michael Vescovo Oct 19 '17 at 23:03
  • Unfortunately it's not quite as easy as @MichaelVescovo says. Changing the "Format" changes e.g. the LC_TIME environment variable, which provides localized date formats. Applications may or may not make use of that info. In this case, the weekday and month names are controlled by LC_TIME, while the displayed order of the date components seems to be controlled by the selected "Language" instead, and I would suspect that the order is technically stated as part of the translations. If I select UK English as both Language and Format, the order is changed for me in all the places you mention. – Gunnar Hjalmarsson Oct 20 '17 at 00:05
  • In other words I'm not sure that there is a bug here. – Gunnar Hjalmarsson Oct 20 '17 at 00:06
  • @GunnarHjalmarsson I made no statements about difficulty. I'm simply trying to determine if this is a bug or not, and regardless of weather it is or not, if there is anything I can do to update it. It seems UK format does the trick for most things, but since the Australian format doesn't do the same thing (as it should), then it looks like a bug. How is this not a bug? The tweak tool is not managed by Ubuntu (AFAIK) so that would be an issue with that tool I guess (possibly by design). – Michael Vescovo Oct 20 '17 at 00:13
  • @MichaelVescovo: Given how (I think that) this is designed, and if the correct Australian order is "20 October" rather than "October 20", I'd say that it's an incomplete 'translation' into Australian English. Sure, you may call that a bug if you like. ;) My point is that it's not an obvious bug in the application, and I'm pretty sure that nothing can be done about it in tweak tool. – Gunnar Hjalmarsson Oct 20 '17 at 00:28
  • If it doesn't behave as expected then it's a bug, no matter how trivial it may seem. Why can noting be done in the tweak tool? Just update it. Weather they are willing to is another story. – Michael Vescovo Oct 20 '17 at 00:34
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    This is the kind of 'translations' I'm talking about: <https://translations.launchpad.net/ubuntu/artful/+source/gnome-shell/+pots/gnome-shell/en_AU/+translate?batch=10&show=all&search=%25b – Gunnar Hjalmarsson Oct 20 '17 at 00:48
  • @GunnarHjalmarsson that's interesting. Makes sense. Thanks for the link. – Michael Vescovo Oct 20 '17 at 03:25
  • @user535733 a reboot includes a logout and login. – Michael Vescovo Oct 20 '17 at 03:26

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