Author: William.Allen.Simpson

Description:
In concert with [bug 5089], the template {date} would be reserved. It would be
used exclusively for any date with BC(E), or AD/CE, that is not notable enough
to wikilink, but needs an era preference expansion.

The template should have 3 optional parameters.

{date} will display the current date preference as a string.

{date|year} will expand to "AD year" or "year CE" when the year is positive
numeric, "year BC" or "year BCE" when the year is negative numeric, "1st
century BC" or "1st century BCE" for any other text string. Note that {era} is
required for AD/CE text, as such an era change is expected to be notable.

{date|year|month} will expand to "[[month]], AD [[year]]" or "[[month]],
[[year]] CE" when the year is positive numeric, "[[month]], [[year]] BC" or
"[[month]], [[year]] BCE" when the year is negative numeric, and the month, year
display will follow the date preferences. All parameters will be numeric.

{date|year|month|day} will expand to "[[day month]], AD [[year]]" or "[[day
month]] CE, [[year]]" when the year is positive numeric "[[day month]], [[year]]
BC" or "[[day month]], [[year]] BCE" when the year is negative numeric, and the
day month, year display will follow the date preferences. All parameters will
be numeric.

Indeed, it might be particularly handy to have the date preferences handled
during expansion to avoid a second pass by the parser?

Version: unspecified
Severity: enhancement