Setting date and time formats

Often, the data that you import into Analyst's Notebook contains date and time information. In general, this information can come in a range of different formats. If your data contains dates and times, your import specification must tell the application how to interpret them.

About this task

You must specify how the values in each date, time, or date & time column that you assigned on the Assign Columns page are formatted. To provide location context for date & time values, you must select a time zone. If you do not specify the correct format, the application might import the data incorrectly or fail to import the data at all.

Procedure

As soon as you assign an incoming column to a date, time, or date & time property in the design, the import wizard gains a Date & Time Format page. To set a date and time format:
  1. Click a column in the table at the top of the page.
    As you click through each column, the Custom format field reflects the format of your data, along with an example. If your data contains 10 Dec 2018, the notation in the format field is dd MMM yyyy. If the values in the column do not match the selected format, a yellow triangle is displayed in the column header. A yellow triangle is also displayed next to any values for which the format is invalid.
    Note:
    A valid date format might not be the correct date format because sometimes the day and month are transposed. For example, 10 December 2018 can be expressed as 10/12/2018 or 12/10/2018. If your import data expresses 10 December 2018 as 10/12/2018 within a column, the mm/dd/yyyy date format is valid however October 12 2018 is incorrect. Be aware of how the numerical expression of days and months in your import might be interpreted.
    You can change the display codes available to suit your data such as removing the leading zero in single digit days, hours and months. You can switch to a 12 hour clock format, a two digit year and have longer day and month names if required. Click the relevant checkbox beneath the Custom format field. If you want to include words in your column data, you can use quotation marks to differentiate the text. For example, if the value in your column is Date 10/12/2018, the notation in the Custom format field should be "Date" dd/MM/yyyy.
    Note:
    If you think you have the correct format but the yellow triangle still appears, check the values in your date and time columns for extra characters such as spaces. You can remove unwanted characters by using Trim Characters on the Column Actions page.
  2. Change the time zone of the source data, unless you want your import to default to the same time zone as the chart.
    If you are connected to i2 Analyze, and have set new Date and time only custom properties, you can select time zones on the Date & Time Format page. You can have a number of columns that contain date and time properties, therefore you can set different time zones for each if required. If your columns are date only or time only, the time zone drop-down option is unavailable.
  3. If you set custom types with date and time, or date, or time properties in your import design, you can enable copying to timeline charts on the Date & Time Format page. This function is available for custom types only. The charting scheme sets the item date and time for you when you use types specified in your i2 Analyze aligned schema.
  4. If you are working with a classic import specification, the Date & Time Format page displays a Make the first item controlling when multiple items have the same date & time option. This is useful if you want to chart a timeline for presentation purposes, and have events that occur at the same time. Click the checkbox to select the option.
    Note:
    When working with controlled items, you can also use the Grouped by Time layout as an alternative way to display temporal data. The settings in this option give you a fine level of control over the distance between items. The layout allows you to position items within a second of each other, so all the items with the same time for example, close together by selecting the All Items options then setting a small distance into the Separate Items By value, and a larger value into the Separate Groups By setting.

Results

Date and time properties in the import design can now receive values from the incoming data correctly.