Change Default Date Formats

[Ultrabenosaurus]

I'm going nuts over this, why are the formats in the Settings app locked? I just want to change my default date formats to YYYY-MM-DD like 2021-09-14, but all the places in the Settings app that show formats are not editable.

I've looked online for ways to change the date format in Zorin or Ubuntu but they just recommend changing my system locale to en_DK. I don't want to change my locale, I want to change my date format. Why is this so hard? Setting the date format shouldn't be this hard.

I only found one other thread in this forum that was specifically about changing the date format:

Change panel's date format

I know there is this site which helps with the format of the date and time for the panel. but where do I find the settings for it in zorin? My date format is currently like this [Screenshot from 2021-03-08 16-22-06] but I want it to be like “Mo, 08.03, [Time 24H format]”. Have the gnome version of zorin. Thanks in advance.

It recommends installing something called Clock Override from the Software store followed by GNOME Tweaks. Unfortunately Clock Override appears to no longer be in the store, and after installing GNOME Tweaks there does not appear to be anything relevant baked in.

Can someone please let me know how to just change the default date formats?

[riffer]

Clock override is a Gnome extension:
https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/1206/clock-override/

[Ultrabenosaurus]

Thank you for finding it! After looking at the description and screenshot on that page, it doesn't look like it actually does what I want anyway...

That extensions is for setting the appearance of the clock in the taskbar, not changing the default date format of the whole system. Darn.

[Aravisian]

Are you sure it doesn't?

Customize Time & Date Format in Ubuntu 18.04 Gnome Panel

[Ultrabenosaurus]

Unfortunately it definitely does not change the system date format as I wish.

As the page riffer linked specifically says the extension affects only the GNOME top bar / taskbar I didn't try it out. Despite your link also saying the same, I have now tried it out just in case and yeah, it only affects the clock shown in the taskbar.

Dates shown in the system settings (both formats and date & time), in the widget / notification pop-up when you click on the clock, and in the Modified - Time column of folder windows do not use the YYYY-MM-DD format after setting this Clock Override extension to %F %T format.

[jgordon]

Does this help? It changes the locale files to use your format. I assume one downside is that any updates would overwrite your changes.

How to change date formats on Ubuntu

[Ultrabenosaurus]

If the only solution is that involved and would probably get wiped whenever the OS updates, that's not a solution IMO. Zorin are projecting version 16 as a simple, user-friendly replacement for Windows, but you can't even change the date format.

Honestly this isn't my only severely frustrating niggle with Zorin. For simple use-cases, like a machine with a single monitor and a user who doesn't care about the date format, Zorin seems to be great. I just keep butting heads over little things that really slow down my productivity and just aren't worth the time investment apparently required to fix them.

I'll post a new thread later with my experiences so far, for posterity, but I'm going to trial a few other distros in my quest to ditch Windows 10 and dodge Windows 11; I just don't get along with Zorin.

[Aravisian]

@Ultrabenosaurus

I'll post a new thread later with my experiences so far, for posterity, but I'm going to trial a few other distros in my quest to ditch Windows 10 and dodge Windows 11; I just don't get along with Zorin.

I apologize for my misunderstanding; I thought changing the date format in the taskbar was your goal.

When I first migrated from Windows to Linux, I did so on Zorin Core. I struggled - a lot. And I complained often. I think at one point, I told Artyom Zorin that Zorin OS was the Worst OS I ever saw.
And I went distro hopping... I tried many... Probably twenty different ones. It was a lot of fun, truth told and quite an experience. I also learned of some new favorite distros.
One of the distros I tested while distro hopping was Zorin OS Lite.
Which ultimately ended me up right back on Zorin OS.

But this also means I have stuck with Zorin OS Lite since then and am still novice with the Zorin OS Core (Gnome) settings and layout.
On my machine, I would check my date formats with the command locale -k LC_TIME instead of using the Gnome GUI.