Is there some simple way to parse different type of dates in java without playing with the date strings?
I have to deal with 6 different types of date:
I don't know if a date will arrive in one format or the other from the server...
thank you!
You can iterate over all formats and try to parse, ignore the exception. If no format fits, throw an exception.
To elaborate on the stock "Use Joda-Time" answer, in Joda-Time you can create a DateTimeParser for each of your 6 formats, then append them to a single DateTimeFormatter.
See the accepted answer to this question: Using Joda Date & Time API to parse multiple formats
The best-known alternative to the standard API is Joda-Time. Also JSR 310 an improved Date/Time API for Java SE 7
I don't think there's an actual "easy" way to deal with such different date formats. If you have the option to nail a "standard date format" to the server that would be the easy way.
A common approach is to build a DateParser for every 'freaky' date format that you have to deal with. Here's an example for your first date, using Joda Time:
String date1 = "16 May 2013 19:27:12 CEST";
DateTimeFormatter fmt = new DateTimeFormatterBuilder()
.appendDayOfMonth(2)
.appendLiteral(' ')
.appendMonthOfYearShortText()
.appendLiteral(' ')
.appendYear(4, 4)
.appendLiteral(' ')
.appendHourOfDay(2)
.appendLiteral(":")
.appendMinuteOfDay(2)
.appendLiteral(":")
.appendSecondOfDay(2)
.appendLiteral(' ')
.appendLiteral("CEST")
.toFormatter();
DateTime parseDateTime = fmt.parseDateTime(date1);
System.out.println(parseDateTime);
I hope this will help you build DateParsers for the other cases. And remember - always save your dates in relation to UTC!
Here is the sample code, for date string like 2001-07-04T12:08:56.235-0700 we need to use following format "yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ"
SimpleDateFormat simpleDateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ");
Date date = simpleDateFormat.parse("2001-07-04T12:08:56.235-0700");
System.out.println(date);
details are available in below mentioned link
