Introduction
A pattern of special characters is used to specify the format of the date. The example below demonstrates some of the characters. For a complete listing, see the javadoc documentation for the SimpleDateFormat class.
Note: This example formats dates using the default locale (which, in the author's case, is Locale.ENGLISH). If the example is run in a different locale, the text (e.g., month names) will not be the same.
The code ...
Code: Java
Format formatter;
// The year
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yy"); // 06
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy"); // 2006
// The month
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("M"); // 9
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MM"); // 09
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MMM"); // Oct
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MMMM"); // October
// The day
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("d"); // 9
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("dd"); // 09
// The day in week
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("E"); // Sat
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("EEEE"); // Saturday
// Get today's date
Date date = new Date();
// Some examples
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yy");
String s = formatter.format(date);
// 10/29/06
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MMM-yy");
s = formatter.format(date);
// 29-Oct-06
// Examples with date and time; see also
// e316 Formatting the Time Using a Custom Format
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy.MM.dd.HH.mm.ss");
s = formatter.format(date);
// 2006.10.29.08.36.33
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("E, dd MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss Z");
s = formatter.format(date);
// Sat, 07 Oct 2006 22:14:02 +0530