Julian Calendar dating. Why?

http://www.mrbeerjangle.com/decodingthedates/

This is a pretty handy website to check the date coding methods of most of the breweries.

 

To be more clear, my understanding is that the 'Julian date' uses the format DDDY, such that the first three digits equate to the number of days in the year, and the last digit is the last digit of the year, for example, 0108 equates to 010 days into the year 2018 meaning Jan 10, 2018. Another example: 1256 equates to 125 days into 2016, meaning May 5th, 2016 (if I did the math correctly). That way, the Gregorian format used in that country is irrelevant in terms of determining the date.

I hope that helps.

 

Interesting. If brewers use a different datestamp on beers that are exported, then that blows my understanding of why they use a Julian date to, to ... somewhere in craft beer ... Limbo?

 

Don't forget to round up (or add 1). xx030 is January 30th, so essentially February. In other words, it's zero-based.

So, 45 is 1.5 - not mid January, mid February, as a better example. A somewhat "duh" thing, but still something stupid I've done with that a quick calculation. Depends on whether being off a month makes a difference to you.


What I don't like is the beers that have Julian somewhere in a much larger number (that might include time) that makes it harder to discern which of the digits are the year (one or two digits) and day of year. I can deal with Julian dating, but only if I can reasonably guess what the date part is.

 

I am holding a bomber of Hoppin' Frog B.O.R.I.S The Crusher Oatmeal Imperial Stout in my hand, and '2665 A2 0843' is stamped on the underside of the bottle (although it was hard to read, let alone find, unless viewed at the correct angle to the light source). It being an imperial stout, you can guess it was likely brewed and bottled to be released late fall or early winter. '266' would be 100 days from the last day of the year, sometime in late September. The '5' would equate to the year 2015. That would put the bottling date at September, 2015.

'0843' is probably the time of day it was bottled. Who knows what the 'A2' means, perhaps something to do to identify the line it was bottled on.

BTW, I looked on their website but saw no explanation of where they put the code or how to decipher it.

 

No, what is incorrectly referred to as the "Julian" dating method is just the 3 digit "day of the year" ("DDD") - how, or even if*, the brewer notes the year - one or two digits, letters, before or after the Julian date - is up to them.

* Lagunitas for one did not originally note the year in their code, IIRC?

 

It's because people figured out the Caligula dating scheme.

 

Correct! As a retired U.S. Navy logistician, we used a four digit Julian Date (the last digit of the CY, followed by the day within the CY beginning at 001 & going to 365 or 366) for all request & requisition numbers.

 

Jesskidden,

Thank you for your reply and for your perspective.

I hear you, the Julian date itself, in isolation, is a three digit number.

However, the original question of this thread has no 'right' or 'wrong' answer. If you look at all of the responses in this thread, I hope you will see that there are a number of ways the Julian date is used while including the year: YDDD, DDDY, and so on. I believe ALL the codes using the Julian date that I have seen on beer cans and bottles have had at least four digits.

I invite you to look at this from a broader perspective. It's ALL good, as far as I'm concerned. I hope you will be enjoying a few cold ones; I know I will be!

Joe

 

So, you're advising @jesskidden how he should read this board?

Really?

 

Yeah, I said that:

Here's one - from the largest "craft" brewery (or second largest, depending on who's counting):



BBC's 12 packs and cases list the "Enjoy Before" date, there's a space, and then a 3-digit "day of the year" bottling date - around 5 months earlier.

Probably a forum search would turn up complaints about the era when Lagunitas didn't print a digit for the year, only the 3 digit "day of the year" on their bottles.

 

You mean like ISO 8601?

 

I'm sure Jess is right about the before or after for the year, but there does seem to be a trend for year first. I've never seen a 5 digit Julian date with the year after.

 

I am glad to read here that we are in agreement.

Interesting to read that Lagunitas only used the three digit code in the past. Folks had a good reason to speak up about that.

Adding at least one extra digit for the year makes a lot of sense (at least for most beers); I've seen a number of beers on the shelf that are well over a year old. Generally speaking, that's OK as long as it matures well (and is away from light and heat, of course).

 

Perhaps you misread what i wrote. I wrote INVITE, not advise.

I will risk using the word again. I INVITE YOU to read more carefully. You don't have to if you do not want to; your choice.

I also invite you to take a deep breath, and to then enjoy a cold one.

Cheers!

 

And, I advise you to chill.

 

Very good. We are agreed, and chillin' ...

But, wait. You are now advising me, when you just asked me if I was advising someone else. Dude, you make no sense.

Cheers!

 

Well said and 100% true. This is not rocket science it is as simple as it gets. But we all know why it's done and why a lot of us don't consume products (or minimize consumption) from those playing the game. Cheers

 

Playing with words is something I do.

 

What? You don't count in Base-365?