Visio should support dates earlier than 1899 in timeline

[Kathleen Crouch]

Please don't send me a workaround suggestion, I'm not looking for one. It
would defeat the purpose of the timeline function. Simply put, Visio should
support dates earlier than 1899. That it does not, is ridiculous. Trying to
plot out the progression of important dates in U.S. Supreme Court history is
quickly frustrated by the date limitation. I know for a fact that others have
the same complaint. I really don't understand what Microsoft was thinking
here.

Please create a patch for Visio 2003, or be sure to add it to the next full
version. thanks.

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[LumpJohnny]

In typical fashion, they weren't; It's hard for a company driven solely by
profit and extraction of surplus to imagine non-business applications, much
less waste time with them.

I find it ridiculous, but again typical, as well.

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

I can assure you that there are plenty of business scenarios for dates
earlier than 1899. This is something that we get a lot of requests for and
are considering how to address. The challenge is that we would need to
reinvent a lot of the wheel to accomplish this.

--
Mark Nelson
Office Graphics - Visio
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[John Marshall, MVP]

Actually it is not as drastic as that (unless of course you are considering
some of the extensions I mentioned in a previous conversation. ;-) )

The "simple" solution would be to add a few new formatting options.
Internally, the date is just a number and the date format prescribed by MS
interprets the number in a specific way. So if the MS date format is removed
you can have a timeline of the form 1,2,3,4... or if you redefine how the
number is interpreted, the whole part of the number can represent the year
and the decimal part the month-day rather than the whole part representing
the number of days since 1900 and the decimal part representing the time of
day.

John... Visio MVP

Need stencils or ideas? http://www.mvps.org/visio/3rdparty.htm
Need VBA examples? http://www.mvps.org/visio/VBA.htm
Common Visio Questions http://www.mvps.org/visio/common_questions.htm
Visio Wishlist http://www.mvps.org/visio/wish_list.htm

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

Ah, there's the rub. Yes we could go with that system. But I bet there are
several other systems users would want us to go with. Once we have to treat
values as some form of date, things get complicated. We may be better off
just allowing more flexibility for generic timelines and custom labels.

--
Mark Nelson
Office Graphics - Visio
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Al Edlund]

Visio uses the internal operating system clock for the timeline add-in,
which has the 1899 dependency. You always have the opportunity to draw your
own and apply whatever dates you want.
Al

 

[Al Edlund]

You're correct in that you would have to move the markers manually. Re: the
time information AFAIK the timing is a technical thing in that under the
covers it is a count of days from 0 (in this case in 1899). The limitation
is how many days can be held using the definition (I believe type Long). It
would be a lot easier if everyone in the world would use x64 so different
(extended) data types could be used universally. Until then we are stuck
with it.
Al

 

[Matthew]

Along this line, I am working on three separate projects which require dating
systems that support BC and AD timelines. I want to use Visio to create them,
but I can't figure a way to make it work. Trying to enter a simple linear
string variable sends the program into a fit and it has crashed or hanged as
a result of this. Does anyone know where to get a patch or a plug-in,
preferably an “OFFICIAL†one, that will allow me to use a simple linear scale
using the timeline charts to plot events in ancient times through modern???
This is maddening

Thanks
Matthew

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

Visio's timeline diagram is tied to dates supported by the Windows operating
system. Generally to represent dates outside that range, you need to add
your own labels on top of the timeline which would cover up the timeline
shape's. Of course at that point, you may decide that drawing you own
timeline is easier.

--
Mark Nelson
Office Graphics - Visio
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.