This topic covers formatting options for formatting the display of dates, times, and numbers within LabKey Sample Manager.
Set DateTime Display Format
An administrator can configure the way DateTime values are displayed in the application. This does not affect how values may be imported, but can be used to standardize or simplify the display to users, using the
format strings outlined below.
For example, the default display string is
yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm. If your research is concerned only with dates and does not need to track or see the times as well, you can remove them from how values are shown to users as follows:
- Select > Application Settings.
- Edit the Default display format for date-times to suit your needs. Shown here, the default without the time portion:
This new format will be used to display all DateTime values in all projects in your application.
Note that time zone values (z, Z, X) are not supported in Sample Manager or LabKey Biologics.
Date and DateTime Format Strings
Format strings used to describe dates and date-times must be compatible with the format accepted by the Java class
SimpleDateFormat. For more advanced options and examples, see the
LabKey Server documentation. The following table has a partial guide to pattern symbols you may find useful in Sample Manager:
| Letter | Date/Time Component | Examples |
|---|
| y | Year | 'yyyy' = 1996; 'yy' = 96 |
| M | Month in year | 'MMMM' = January; 'MMM' = Jan; 'MM' = 01 |
| d | Day in month | 'dd' = 10 |
| a | Am/pm marker | PM |
| k | Hour in day (1-24) | 24 |
| h ....... | Hour in am/pm (1-12) ....... | 12 ....... |
| m | Minute in hour | 30 |
| s | Second in minute | 33 |
Note that the LabKey date parser does not recognize time-only date strings. This means that you need to enter a full date string even when you wish to display time only. For example, you might enter a value of "2/2/09 4:00 PM" in order to display "04 PM" when using the format string "hh aa".
Number Format Strings
Format strings for Integer and Decimal fields must be compatible with the format that the java class
DecimalFormat accepts. A valid DecimalFormat is a pattern specifying a prefix, numeric part, and suffix. For more information see the
Java documentation. The following table has an abbreviated guide to pattern symbols:
| Symbol | Location | Localized? | Meaning |
|---|
| 0 | Number | Yes | Digit |
| # | Number | Yes | Digit, zero shows as absent |
| . | Number | Yes | Decimal separator or monetary decimal separator |
| - | Number | Yes | Minus sign |
| , | Number | Yes | Grouping separator |
Examples
The following examples apply to Date Type fields.
| Format String | Display Result |
|---|
| yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm | 2008-05-17 01:45 |
| yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm a | 2008-05-17 01:45 PM |
| yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss.SSS | 2008-05-17 01:45:55.127 |
| MMMM dd yyyy | January 17 2008 |
The following examples apply to Decimal fields.
| Format String | Display Result |
|---|
| <no string> | 85.0 |
| 0 | 85 |
| 000 | 085 |
| .00 | 85.00 |
| 000.000 | 085.000 |
| 000,000 | 085,000 |
| -000,000 | -085,000 |
Java Reference Documents
Dates:
https://docs.oracle.com/en/java/javase/12/docs/api/java.base/java/text/SimpleDateFormat.htmlNumbers:
https://docs.oracle.com/en/java/javase/12/docs/api/java.base/java/text/DecimalFormat.html
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