In the Zen theme the date and time tags above each posting ignore the date and time format settings and show in an archaic date format. Worse, the important time is missing altogether.

Probably very easy to fix, so please ...

Example: http://winhlp.com/

Hans-Georg

CommentFileSizeAuthor
#13 removed_datetime.patch1.79 KBjohnalbin

Comments

chadchandler’s picture

chadchandler commented

Try going into your admin>>config>>date & time and changing the "short" "medium" long" formats.

zirafa’s picture

zirafa commented

That's because the node.tpl.php file has a custom date format string. It doesn't use the default drupal date string formatting, you can easily change this by having print $submitted instead or reading up on format_date.

hgmichna’s picture

hgmichna commented

Thanks for your assistance! It doesn't work for me yet, but we're probably close. I did this:

  <?php if ($submitted): ?>
/* 2007-08-28 Hans-Georg Michna - changed 1 line:
    <span class="submitted"><?php print t('Posted ') . format_date($node->created, 'custom', "F jS, Y") . t(' by ') . theme('username', $node); ?></span>
*/
    <span class="submitted"><?php print t('!date — !username', array('!username' => theme('username', $node), '!date' => format_date($node->created))); ?></span>
  <?php endif; ?>

But it has no effect. I took the line from another theme (Garland), where the time appears. Is there any other place in the PHP code where this may be done? I'm not a PHP programmer and don't understand the entire Drupal anyway.

Let us not forget that it is still a slight bug: the time is missing. Even if you can help me solve it, everybody else using Zen is still missing the time.

Hans-Georg

hgmichna’s picture

hgmichna commented

Embarrassing when one tries to modify PHP stuff without knowing how to do it. Second, this time successful, try was this in comment.tpl.php:

<!-- 2007-08-28 Hans-Georg Michna - Changed 1 line:
    <div class="submitted"><?php print t('On ') . format_date($comment->timestamp, 'custom', 'F jS, Y'); ?> <?php print theme('username', $comment) . t(' says:'); ?></div>
-->
    <div class="submitted"><?php print t('!date — !username', array('!username' => theme('username', $comment), '!date' => format_date($comment->timestamp))); ?></div>

And this works perfectly for comments. The similar code for nodes (after swapping /* */ for

) does not work. Probably a stupid error on my side. I'll see if I can find it. Sorry for my PHP-clumsiness.

Still fixing the missing time for me doesn't mean fixing it for everyone, and so I think this bug report should stay active.

Hans-Georg

hgmichna’s picture

hgmichna commented

Got it. Sorry again for the confusion. Zen, unlike Garland, has an additional file named node-forum.tpl.php, which needed to be modified as well.

Thanks again for the good hint!

Nonetheless I'll keep recommending to change this in the next release.

Hans-Georg

zirafa’s picture

zirafa commented

You may want to familiarize yourself with PHP date formatting settings, which will basically convert a timestamp to whatever date formatting you want. In Zen's case, it was a conscious choice not to print the time to show that the date can be customized.

PHP's Date Function

In Drupal we have a special format_date function that lets you print out long, short, medium forms or custom formatting (Zen uses custom formatting). When you use custom formatting, you can refer to the above PHP date link for how to customize the date formatting.

Drupal's format_date

Hope this helps.
Farsheed

hgmichna’s picture

hgmichna commented

Thank you for the good links and information! Very interesting, and it solves the problem for me.

Let me propose anyway to change the custom format for the next release such that it contains the time. It can still be a deviating custom format if that is preferred, but take into consideration that most Drupal administrators are not PHP programmers and are unable to change the date-time format. I could do it only because I happen to be a software developer (though unfortunately without knowlege of PHP).

Hans-Georg

johnalbin’s picture

johnalbin
they/他
Primary language English
Location Taipei, Taiwan
commented
Title: Zen theme ignores date and time format settings » allow date/time format customization (theme settings api integration)
Version: 5.x-0.6 » 5.x-1.x-dev
Assigned: Unassigned » johnalbin
Category: bug » feature
Priority: Minor » Normal

I think that most people have their own preferred date/time display settings. And hard-coding one format into the .tpl.php files will inevitably displease some people no matter what is picked. Even picking one of the standard date formats, small", "medium" or "large," doesn’t allow enough customization.

Editing the code in node.tpl.php and node-forum.tpl.php is the only short-term solution.

But, the best route is to allow people to easily customize their date format via a form. i.e. Theme Settings API integration.

kdebaas’s picture

kdebaas commented
Category: feature » bug

On a related note, the language specific 'Posted by' strings, and the non-localized formatting of the date should probably not be hardcoded into the .tpl.php files either.

hgmichna’s picture

hgmichna commented

Why not let the admin enter a date and time format string? That's probably much better than giving him the choice of three preprogrammed formats. It's also extremely easy to program, actually a simplification. May go into the Drupal core though.

Hans-Georg

johnalbin’s picture

johnalbin
they/他
Primary language English
Location Taipei, Taiwan
commented

The "Posted by" string is a part of Drupal core. It’s not handled by Zen.

Also, how would one make the formatting of the date localized? It seems for each language, one would need to set the PHP formatting string and not just translate the string for the month name; that’s not something that is currently handled by the locale or i18n modules, is it?

kdebaas’s picture

kdebaas commented

I beg to differ. The 'Posted by' string can be found in the template.php file in the zen theme folder, on line 235.

Also, when using the format_date function with one of the configured formats of Drupal (such as 'small', 'medium', 'large'), instead of a custom php format string, the date seems to adapt to the interface language. This is true, for example, in Garland, which displays the date in the language of your Drupal install. And now also in my Zen subtheme, after adapting the main zen template.php.

johnalbin’s picture

johnalbin
they/他
Primary language English
Location Taipei, Taiwan
commented
Title: allow date/time format customization (theme settings api integration) » Remove date/time format customization from base theme
Status: Active » Needs review
StatusFileSize
new removed_datetime.patch1.79 KB

The 'Posted by' string can be found in the template.php file in the zen theme folder, on line 235.

Oh. There it is! :-)

Ok. I would agree with you then, Klaas. The base theme shouldn't be messing with the date/time formatting. That should be left to the sub-theme.

I'll remove that from template.php and from comment.tpl.php if there are no objections. These bits of code should be moved to some HOWTO documentation on customizing the date/time.

Everyone agree?

johnalbin’s picture

johnalbin
they/他
Primary language English
Location Taipei, Taiwan
commented
Title: Remove date/time format customization from base theme » Remove un-localizable date/time format from base theme
kdebaas’s picture

kdebaas commented

Seems good to go. Unfortunately I can't actually test the patch until next week.

kdebaas’s picture

kdebaas commented

Actually, I found some time this morning to review the patch:

I reverted my template.php file to its original state and applied the patch to template.php and comment.tpl.php.

I can confirm that the date and author of the posts in my Zen subtheme are now correctly displayed in the language I set for my Drupal install.

johnalbin’s picture

johnalbin
they/他
Primary language English
Location Taipei, Taiwan
commented
Status: Needs review » Fixed

Fixed in 5.x-1.x-dev.

Anonymous’s picture

(not verified) commented
Status: Fixed » Closed (fixed)

Automatically closed -- issue fixed for two weeks with no activity.