It is often useful to look up a document by its date. But the DocRef date field is specified as "When this document reference was created" - a fact that seems to be about the indexing of the document rather than its creation. And which could change every time it's viewed, in a facade architecture.

Recommend support for a document date, either instead of (by rewriting the definition) or in addition to this somewhat technical feature.

"Date of the composition, signature, or release of the document, as appropriate to its type."