How to I read in a String as a date?

Question

I have a simple block of code as follows which takes in a date using SimpleDateFormat, creates a Date object and spits it out textually again

SimpleDateFormat dateformat = new SimpleDateFormat("dd/MM/YYYY HH:mm");
Date date = dateformat.parse("23/10/2014 14:00");
System.out.println(date.toString());

I was expecting date.toString() to spit out a similar representation of the date I'd entered, but instead I this: Mon Dec 30 14:00:00 GMT 2013 which isn't the same date at all as I typed in. (though the time is the same correct.)

What's wrong?

I'm happy with the format coming out, but the problem is that it's definitely a different date to the one I entered! — Odyssey, Oct 24 '14 at 15:16

Odyssey · Accepted Answer · 2014-10-24T15:22:48.040

3

Choosing a little y for year fixes the issue, and the output changes to

Thu Oct 23 14:00:00 BST 2014

Y represents Week year
y represents Year

The code now reads

SimpleDateFormat dateformat = new SimpleDateFormat("dd/MM/yyyy HH:mm");
Date date = dateformat.parse("23/10/2014 14:00");
System.out.println(date.toString());

edited Oct 24 '14 at 15:22

answered Oct 24 '14 at 15:19

Odyssey

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How to I read in a String as a date?

1 Answers1