RSS Advisory Board

RSS Validator

Message

Problematical RFC 822 date-time value

Explanation

The specified date-time value, while technically valid, is likely to cause interoperability issues.

The value specified must meet the Date and Time specifications as defined by RFC822, with the exception that the year SHOULD be expressed as four digits.

Additionally:

  • RFC 822 § 3.4.2: Exactly ONE SPACE should be used in place of arbitrary linear-white-space and comment sequences.
  • RFC 822 § 3.4.7: The case shown in this specification is suggested for message-creating processes.
  • RFC 1123 § 5.2.14:: the military time zones are specified incorrectly in RFC-822: they count the wrong way from UT (the signs are reversed). As such, they shoud be avoided.

Solution

Change the date-time to contain a four digit year, no comments, and either US or numeric timezone indicators, all single spaced. Here are examples:

<pubDate>Wed, 02 Oct 2002 08:00:00 EST</pubDate>

<pubDate>Wed, 02 Oct 2002 13:00:00 GMT</pubDate>

<pubDate>Wed, 02 Oct 2002 15:00:00 +0200</pubDate>

For best results, conform to the recommendations in James Holderness' RFC822 date support survey.

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