CRITICAL ISSUE

Status: RESOLVED

Root Cause

Technical: Microsoft had modified Java script in Sharepoint in an area of functionality which handles refinable date formatting, as per a users Region Settings. In the UK, this meant that any date, where the first part was greater than 12 could not be displayed and "NAN NAN" was returned, and where the first part was equal to or less than 12, returned a date incorrectly formatted.

Communication: To compound the technical cause of this critical incident, the modification was deployed globally to all SharePoint licences, without being communicated. Without a Microsoft communication to immediately refer back to this caused further delay to getting a swift solution.
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Some clients have reported that dates are displaying incorrectly (e.g. 1st October 2020 displaying as 10th January) or are displaying the term "NAN NAN" ("not a number") or "Invalid Date". This is affecting all (Classic and Modern) SharePoint users in our client community and have received a number of reports already.

If you have experienced this issue, do please report it to us so we have an accurate understanding of the impact to our user community which also helps us mitigate such issues in the future.

There has been an adjustment to the date format used by Microsoft in Classic SharePoint sites, but there does not appear to be any impact on raw data, only on the way the data is currently being displayed.

Example 1: a date of 01/10/2020 is written to file

BEFORE this incident, this would display as 1st October 2020

AFTER this incident, this date displays as 10th January 2020

Example 2: a date of 18/10/2020 is written to file

BEFORE this incident, this would display as 18th October 2020

AFTER this incident, this date displays as "NAN NAN" (since there is no 18th month )

Updates

In this section of the article we will provide regular updates on this issue.

4th February 2021 - pm

Microsoft have begun to deploy their fix!

Whilst this is great news, it does mean we´ll need to pause and take stock of where we all are in order to find the best way forward together!

The Microsoft fix has become available before we could load our update to anyone´s Production version, so there´s nothing to unpick in this regard.

Some of our clients can already see the Microsoft fix has arrived in their Production version and dates are appearing correctly

If you have ALREADY received a ClearPeople fix into your UAT - We will be working with you to reverse our update.

If you were PLANNING on taking a ClearPeople fix - Our recommendation is that you wait for the Microsoft fix to arrive. If you have any concerns, please discuss with your CSM

If you are only now becoming aware of the issue - No action required!

4th February 2021 - am

Microsoft have now identified the issue on their side and and are working quickly to resolve this bug, which is related to API output. We have not been advised of any timescales for when this fix will be ready for deployment.

ACTION with Microsoft to provide fix and to mitigate future instances.

Before Microsoft got any real traction with their investigation, the ClearPeople team worked extremely hard to identify where the bug had been introduced and to provide an update to our code to handle this [Date Format] issue. Our enhancement is already tested and deployed to a client UAT environment. Our fix is correct for the current condition of SharePoint, but we cannot guarantee the efficacy of the fix after any corrective action from Microsoft.

Whilst this issue affects all clients, we at ClearPeople recognise the impact can be felt very differently by our users, and we want our users to take advantage of an early fix should they choose.

ACTION with ClearPeople to communicate options and risks to the client community. There are two options available to our clients:

ClearPeople update

This is available for deployment now. It should be noted that this fix will resolve the issue today, but may need to be reviewed again once any Microsoft fix becomes available. In a worst case scenario, the deployment of the Microsoft fix causes new instances of [Date Format] issues, but we expect to be able to handle this by rolling back our fix.

Microsoft Fix

Clients are entitled to wait for the deployment of a Microsoft fix. We do not have any timings nor what their technical approach to the issue will be (a fix-forward or a roll-back). We expect that the fix from Microsoft would become available in your SharePoint with no intervention from ClearPeople.

Your CSM is on hand to discuss these options with you, to determine which is most appropriate for your particular installation. Please contact them if you have any concerns or queries.

3rd February 2021

Response received from Microsoft describing user side actions to review date and regional settings. Further information passed to Microsoft outlining observed code updates.

ACTION with Microsoft to confirm Root Cause.

ClearPeople enhancement developed to better handle [Date Format] changes. Signed-of in Test this morning and approved for deployment to client UAT environments.

ACTION with the Success Team to update and schedule UAT deployments.

2nd February 2021

Fix developed and deployed to Test environment.

Support ticket raised with Microsoft to determine Root Cause [#24004052]

Published dates in SharePoint sites are displaying the incorrect date or [NAN]