Excel Number Format: What is “[$-409]”?

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To clarify what others have said:

The [$-409] is a locale code, given in hexadecimal. Prefixing a date with a certain locale code determines what is shown when you use the various date time format codes. For example using the date

November 28, 1973 11:28:13 AM

as an example for the following table:

Format Code  409 (English United States)  804 (Chinese PRC)
===========  ===========================  =================
m            11                           11
mm           11                           11
mmm          Nov                          十一月
mmmm         November                     十一月
d            27                           27
dd           27                           27
ddd          Mon                          二
dddd         Monday                       星期二
y            73                           73
yy           73                           73
yyy          1973                         1973
yyyy         1973                         1973
AM/PM        AM                           上午

So in the end the same format code with two different locale identifiers, gives different results:

[$-409]mmmm dd yyyy  h:mm AM/PM
November 27 1973  11:28 AM


[$-804]mmmm dd yyyy  h:mm AM/PM
十一月 27 1973  11:28 上午

Since finding a list of locale codes is like pulling teeth, here are some references:

Language Identifier Constants and Strings (Primary source, archive.is)

Windows Locale Codes Sorted by Locale (archive.is)

Windows Locale Codes Sorted by Locale (archive.org, archive.is)

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