I am an 82 year old computer bumbler, I get there somehow and will use the command line if forced to do so, as long as there are only a few lines.
I am running Ubuntu Matè 24.04 LTS and Thunderbird 115.12.2
I have a foible and have always used the date format dd/mm/yyyy in my email folders.
While I could not care that Matè shows today as Sat Jul 13 2024 on the top task bar, I do not want Thunderbird to show the date as mm/dd/yyyy in my folders.
The remedies that one finds online are either old, complicated, seem to be OS specific or dubious.
I have not ever run into this problem before, in that there was always an easy remedy but long forgotten. Why it should seemingly be an intractable issue now puzzles me, when allowing the user a choice is not an unreasonable expectation.
Does anyone have a practical fix? I would not be surprised if there is a ready remedy as plain as a pikestaff but completely overlooked by me!
I don't know how it happened, but my usage within Thunderbird is dd/mm/yyyy without my doing anything. Living in the UK, this seems to have happened without conscious effort.
Derek
It seems to me that when you choose your time zone / location, your date format is set at what is taken to be the perceived standard time and date format for your country.
In practice, date format usage in South Africa is flexible - there are some 3 formats used, two of which are dd/mm/yyyy and mm/dd/yyyy.
I looked at using the UK as my location but could not work out how to set the time at South African standard time, which is UTC + 2.
EdwinJ
You may want to test different regional formats. These include date representation as well. Try switching between English (South Africa) and English (United Kingdom), for example. Your timezone will not be affected.
Control Center -> Language Support -> Regional Formats
Hi, Ironfoot.
Your info was invaluable - I had no idea that the system date, time currency, number format and specific country were to be found there.
I have tried numerous permutations and countries and an alternative language. Many restarts were done or logging in and out.
The top taskbar is still Tue Jul 16 2024 but Thunderbird is 2024/07/16.
That is preferable to having the month first and the taskbar is of no consequence.
Thank you for your help.
EdwinJ
You can try open TB, select menu Edit -> Settings, select General in the left pane, scroll to Date and Time formatting section and verify available formats:
Thanks you, "ugnvs", I tried using English (UK) and English (South Africa) but the date format stays yyyy/mm/dd.
I have resigned myself to living with this. At least it is no longer mm/dd/yyyy format, which confuses me in my dotage!
Here is an article about Thunderbird date and time formats. Worth reading and experimenting. I think, intl.date_time.pattern_override.date_short preference is what you may want to configure.
I remember some old discussion about panel datetime indicator not respecting regional formats. Luckily, it is configurable. Please, check the following thread:
