[whatwg] Please consider adding a couple more datetime <input> types - type="year" and type="month-day"

[Henri Sivonen]

On Aug 24, 2010, at 15:32, Andrew Hayward wrote:

>>>>> * it has the *semantic* of being a year, which is a special type of
>>>>> number (potentially more than four digits if you subscribe to "Long
>>>>> Now"[1] methodology, or fewer than four as Andy noted).
>>>> 
>>>> Why is it useful to declare this semantic to the browser? What functional difference do you envision compared to a field that accepts an integer (potentially with min and max values relevant to the site)?
>>> 
>>> Future browser could offer a calendar tool to fill input fields that have a date semantic. While this would be appropriate, it would not be appropriate to offer a calendar tool for other integer data e.g. an input field that asks the user for his monthly income in USD.
>> 
>> What kind of calendar tool is more efficient for entering a year (year only without a month or day) than a UI that is optimized for entering an integer (typically text field plus spinbox arrows that also respond to arrow keys and input method defaulting to digits on phones and similar)?
>> 
>> (Also "future browser could" is a bit weak unless someone writing code for a browser indicates that he/she is actively implementing a given feature.)
> 
> "Future browser" issues aside, it's entirely plausible that a browser
> might allow me to drop events (from my calendar software, for example,
> or just something else semantically a 'date' on the web) onto a
> 'date'-identified input field, extracting the relevant pieces of
> information and filling as appropriate.

Do you have a concrete use case where you'd prefer to drop events to a *year-precision* field over entering a number in a field?

To me, the case of dropping events seems more plausible in the case of day-precision fields.

-- 
Henri Sivonen
hsivonen at iki.fi
http://hsivonen.iki.fi/