DateTimeCalendarClassNames

This choice is about how we should name the calendar classes.

The following class names are believed to be agreed:

• Year
• YearMonth
• MonthDay
• YearWeek
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Option 1 - Obvious names (JDK clash)

• Date
• Time
• DateTime

These names are a gamble, based on how rapidly JSR-310 replaces the older API. I believe that it won't be that rapid, and as such the confusion simply isn't worth it.

Option 2 - Minimal suffix

•  !DateYMD
•  !TimeHMS
•  !DateTime

This works by adding the least possible to get a unique class name. It has the advantage that IDE auto complete for a date or time will rapidly find the relevant class (although DateYMD is after DateTime alphabetically). The downside is that it uses abbreviations, and some may assume that only the year-month-day fields are accessible, and not day of week/week of weekyear etc.

Variations on the suffix theme might include Date310/Time310 or DateJSR/TimeJSR.

Option 3 - Calendar prefix

• CalendarDate
• CalendarTime
• CalendarDateTime

A 'calendar date' makes sense, but a calendar time' or 'calendar date and time' doesn't really. A desk calendar has dates on it, not times.

Option 4 - Wall prefix

• WallDate
• WallTime
• WallDateTime

A 'wall time' makes sense (the time shown on a wall clock), but a 'wall date' or 'wall date and time' is stretching a little (not as bad as 'calendar time' though, as you could have a calendar on the wall).

Option 5 - Calendar/Wall combination

• CalendarDate
• WallTime
• DateTime

Each element makes sense and is well named individually. But it is unclear that there is a connection between the three classes. ie. that CalendarDate + WallTime -> DateTime.

Option 6 - NoZone prefix

• NoZoneDate
• NoZoneTime
• NoZoneDateTime

The no zone prefix refers to the lack of timezone. Describing a class by what it doesn't have seems backwards however.

Option 7 - Local prefix

• LocalDate
• LocalTime
• LocalDateTime

The local prefix refers to the date/time/date-time being independent of timezone and local to the observer. It meets the common prefix test for easy learning - LocalDate + LocalTime -> LocalDateTime. Local is also a short prefix (being short does help on readability. Finally, it will be familiar to Joda-Time upgraders.

Apparantly, RFC2445 (icalendar) uses the 'local' terminology for "A local-time event at 5pm occurs at 5pm no matter what time zone the participant is in" (via Neal Gafter).

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