Template:Start date

This purpose of the start date template is to return the date (or date-time) that an event or entity started or was created. It also includes duplicate, machine-readable date (or date-time) in the ISO date format (which is hidden by CSS), for use inside other templates (or table rows) which emit microformats. It should be used only once in each such template and never used outside such templates. The hidden date degrades gracefully when CSS is not available.

When not to use this template
Do not use this template for:
 * dates that are uncertain e.g., "before 4 April 1933"; "around 18 November 1939".
 * dates outside the range given under "Limitation", below.
 * other, secondary dates
 * outside microformat-emitting templates - if in doubt, see the parent template's documentation
 * more than one date in any parent template

Syntax

 * (MM and SS are optional; TimeZone may be a numerical value, or "Z" for UTC; see examples)
 * (MM and SS are optional; TimeZone may be a numerical value, or "Z" for UTC; see examples)


 * Examples
 * → "1993"
 * → "February 1993"
 * → "February 24, 1993"
 * → "08:30, February 24, 1993"
 * → "February 24, 1993 (+01:00)"
 * → "February 24, 1993 (-07:00)"
 * → "08:30:23, February 24, 1993"
 * → "08:30:23, February 24, 1993 (UTC)"
 * → "08:30:23, February 24, 1993 (+01:00)"
 * → "08:30:23, February 24, 1993 (-07:00)"

An optional parameter,, can be set to "y" or "yes" (or indeed any value) to display the day before the month. This is primarily used in articles using DMY format for dates.


 * Examples
 * → "February 24, 1993"
 * → "08:30, February 24, 1993"

Note: The template will appear broken when the parameters are left blank (as seen hereinbefore). (Hereinbefore? Yup, hereinbefore. Not your average German mistress.)

Parameters
{ "description": "Date that an event or entity started or was created", "params": { "1": {"label": "YYYY", "description": "start year", "type": "number"}, "2": {"label": "MM", "description": "start month", "inherits": "1"}, "3": {"label": "DD", "description": "start day of month", "inherits": "1"}, "4": {"label": "HH", "description": "start hours", "inherits": "1"}, "5": {"label": "MM", "description": "start minutes", "inherits": "1", "default": "0"}, "6": {"label": "SS", "description": "start seconds", "inherits": "5"}, "7": {"label": "TZ", "description": "time zone offset, “+02:00”, “-06:00” or “Z” for UTC", "inherits": "1", "type": "string/line"}, "df": {"label": "day first", "description": "boolean parameter to put the date before the month name", "default": "false", "type": "string/line"} }}