5.1.3.2 Ranges of days

A range of days just as a list of days is used to define recurrent fixed dates and to use only one line in the resource file for them, instead of using several lines in a resource file needed for defining these recurrent fixed dates separately.

A range of days is specified by a ‘#’ separator character and must consist of two elements, namely the starting day and the final day. The starting day and likewise the final day of the range may not be set to a zero value and be not concrete therefore. (This would not make any sense in this context.)

Assuming a fixed date shall always occur during the 1st and the 15th day (inclusive) in every month of the year 1996, e.g. ‘Inside work’, one solution would be on the one hand a fixed date entry in the resource file for the 1st of the month, another one for the 2nd of the month until the 15th of the month, which would be a total of 15 entries in the resource file for such a fixed date⁴⁴.

On the other hand, this expense can be reduced to a total of only one entry in the resource file by using a range of days, which is likewise valid for the 1st until the 15th day in every month, that is

19960001#15 Inside work

The use of ranges of days in the date part is permitted as follows:

• yyyymmwww#www
• yyyymmdd|wwwn#[mm]dd|[mm]wwwn
• yyyy*d|wn[www]#n[www]
• yyyy@e|t|dvar[[+|-]n[www]]#[+|-]n[www]

Preceding table shows that the starting and ending day can only be specified by using date formats of the same type left and right the ‘#’ separator character. Thus, it is not explicitly possible to define a range of days by using different types of date formats, means, fixed date entries like:

1996@e+3fr#1012 In the year 1996: every day that appears within the\
                period of the date 3 Fridays after Easter Sunday's\
                date until the 12th October.

cannot be defined like this. But this problem can be solved by using an inclusive date period %i[date][#[date]] special text for defining the ending day of the range⁴⁵, and the fixed dates are simply produced until the last day of the year, e.g.:

1996@e+3fr#+999 In the year 1996: every day that appears within the\
                period of the date 3 Fridays after Easter Sunday's\
                date until the 12th October.%i0#19961012

See Inclusive date period %i[date][#[date]] special text, for more details.

Some examples to this:

199600mon#fr

In the year 1996 in every month: every day that appears within the day sequence ‘mon, tue, wed, thu, fri’.

000000fr#mon

In every year in every month: every day that appears within the day sequence ‘fri, sat, sun, mon’.

000001fr3#12

In every year in January: every day that appears within the period of the 3rd Friday of the month until the 12th of the month.

00000112#fr3

In every year in January: every day that appears within the period of the 12th of the month until the 3rd Friday of the month.

00000112#augfri3

In every year: every day that appears within the period of the 12th January until the 3rd Friday of August.

0000sep13#99fr9

In every year: every day that appears within the period of the 13th September until the last Friday of December.

0*d1#1fr

In every year: every day that appears within the period of the 1st day of the year until the 1rd Friday of the year.

0*d99fr#333

In every year: every day that appears within the period of the last Friday of the year until the 333rd day of the year.

1996*w1fr#17mo

In the year 1996: every day that appears within the period of the Friday of the 1st week until the Monday of the 17th week.

0@a#+4fr

In every year: every day that appears within the period of the date of the date variable a until the 4th Friday after the date of the date variable a.

1996@e-3#+9fr

In the year 1996: every day that appears within the period of the date three days before the Easter Sunday’s date until the 9th Friday after the date of the Easter Sunday’s date.

1996@t-3#+99fr

In the year 1996: every day that appears within the period of the date three days before today’s date until the last Friday of the year.