oct 12, 2017 as a date

[lezawang]

Hi
I understand excel will accept a date based on the computer settings. If I have my computer short date set as dd/mm/yy then excel will accept the same format unless i custom formatting it. So If my computer is dd/mm/yy then excel will accept 20/10/2017 but not 10/20/2017 (month can not be 20) . So far so good but why excel will take oct 12, 2017 ? my computer is dd/mm/yy and by the way that format oct 12, 2017 is accept no matter what my computer formatting? any idea why? thank you

 

[Jonmo1]

I don't know the programming behind it....
But basically it recognizes the spelled out month name.
That alone eliminates all possible ambiguity of a date (which number is the month, which is the day), bypassing the need to comply with the expected short date formatting.