Note: this was first posted at www.endusersharepoint.com hic: http://www.endusersharepoint.com/2009/11/02/comparing-dates-in-a-data-view-web-part-to-build-a-wss-kpi-in-sharepoint/.

Hoc est adhuc alia notitia in a blog post Comparando palmulas in p visum textus partem in SharePoint.

Hoc est missionem meam:

• Ego consuetudo album.
• The business purpose of the list is to support the idea of a new employee and his/her tasks to be completed within 7 days of starting the job.
• They are in a “warning zone” after 4 days if they have not completed these tasks.
• I want to create a simple dashboard that shows green when they have either completed the task or if they have more than 4 days to complete it.
• I want the dashboard to show yellow if they are in the warning zone.
• I want to to show red if they have not completed the task after the due date.

I borrowed from hoc articulum ad Marc Anderson’s blog (http://mdasblog.wordpress.com/2008/02/19/comparing-dates-in-sharepoint-using-xsl/) to get the comparison logic and hoc articulum ad www.endusersharepoint.com for the basic ideas behind the dashboard (http://www.endusersharepoint.com/2008/12/09/visual-indicators-for-the-masses-kpis-in-wss/) written by Toni Frankola.

You should read the supporting blogs, but the implementation goes like this:

1. Partum a content type (columnas + CT)
2. Create a custom list and associate it with the content type.
3. Create a web part page.
4. Add the custom list to the web part page.
5. Open up the page in SPD.
6. Convert the list to a DVWP.
7. Modify the XSL to generate the dashboard bits.

I have two dates: a warning date and a due date. To compare the dates, my xsl does the following:

 <p:elegerit>

 <!-- When both handbook and policy are signed, we are green regardless of dates. -->

 <p:cum test="@Employee_x0020_Handbook_x003F_ = 1 and @Security_x0020_Policies = 1">

 <img msgstr="/_layouts/images/KPIDefault-0.GIF" alt="No problems"/>

 <a href="/HumanResources/Lists/New Employee Checklist/EditForm.aspx?ID={ID @}&amp;Source=/HumanResources/Shared Documents/New Hire Dashboard.aspx"> [Edit]</a>

 </p:cum>

 <!-- Show amber indicator if we're past the warning date. -->

 <p:cum test="ddwrt:FormatDateTime(filum(ddwrt:Hodie()), 1033, 'yyyyMMdd') &gt;= ddwrt:FormatDateTime(filum(@TaskDueDate), 1033, 'yyyyMMdd')">

 <img msgstr="/_layouts/images/KPIDefault-2.GIF" alt="Overdue"/>

 <a style="border: 0px" href="/HumanResources/Lists/New Employee Checklist/EditForm.aspx?ID={ID @}&amp;Source=/HumanResources/Shared Documents/New Hire Dashboard.aspx"> [Edit]</a>

 </p:cum>

 <!-- Show red indicator if we're passed the due date. -->

 <p:cum test="ddwrt:FormatDateTime(filum(ddwrt:Hodie()), 1033, 'yyyyMMdd') &gt;= ddwrt:FormatDateTime(filum(@Warning_x0020_Date), 1033, 'yyyyMMdd')">

 <img msgstr="/_layouts/images/KPIDefault-1.GIF" alt="Warning"/> 

 <a href="/HumanResources/Lists/New Employee Checklist/EditForm.aspx?ID={ID @}&amp;Source=/HumanResources/Shared Documents/New Hire Dashboard.aspx"> [Edit]</a>

 </p:cum>

 <!-- If we get here, we're earlier than the warning date, so we're green. -->

 <p:alioqui>

 <img msgstr="/_layouts/images/KPIDefault-0.GIF" alt="No problems"/>

 <a href="/HumanResources/Lists/New Employee Checklist/EditForm.aspx?ID={ID @}&amp;Source=/HumanResources/Shared Documents/New Hire Dashboard.aspx"> [Edit]</a>

 </p:alioqui>

 </p:elegerit>

A few key points from above:

• I tried to compare dates without using the ddwrt functionality and got nowhere. I still don’t understand that. They dates displayed correctly, but both “>” and “<” comparisons always failed. In finem, ddwrt came to my rescue (Gratias, iterum, Marc).
• I’m also displaying an [Edit] link to the item. I mainly did this so that I could easily test this out. The link itself may be useful to someone trying to figure it out.
• This is implemented in SharePoint online and works nicely.
• The images I reference in the _layouts directory (/_layouts/images/KPI…) are available out of the box in my environment so they are probably available for you as well.

Here’s a screen shot of what it looks like for me:

</finem>

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