Format error of time difference

Question

I want to calc the time differnce from when the user pressed start and stop. This is what I got so far:

Done in not worker thread:

runTime = System.currentTimeMillis();

Done on main thread:

DateFormat formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("hh:mm:ss.SSS");
Calendar calendar = Calendar.getInstance();
calendar.setTimeInMillis(System.currentTimeMillis() - runTime);
timeTextView.setText("Time: " + formatter.format(calendar.getTime()));

The result is always "01:00:00.000". How come I get a 1hour added to the time? And ofc I press the start and stop button faster then one hour.

did you try setting the time zone? for example `calendar.setTimeZone(TimeZone.getTimeZone("GMT"));` ? — bhowden, Jun 25 '14 at 20:50
See [this question](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6540380/format-milliseconds-to-simpledate-format) — user2340612, Jun 25 '14 at 21:08

IanB · Answer 1 · 2014-06-25T21:12:54.940

0

A simple way of solving (working around ?) this issue:

long startTime = System.currentTimeMillis();

//* do something

long endTime = System.currentTimeMillis();

long elapsedTimeInMilliSecs=(endTime - startTime);

Calendar ...

I use something like this and it works fine.

edited Jun 25 '14 at 21:12

answered Jun 25 '14 at 21:00

IanB

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score 0 · Answer 2 · edited May 23 '17 at 11:57

The result you have is the time since epoch in java, So if you try to print

timeTextView.setText("Time: " + calendar.getTime().toString());

You are more likely to have the result of Wed Dec 31 19:00:00 EST 1969 depends on which TimeZone you currently are. From your code above I got 07:00:00:000 because I am at EST TimeZone. You cant really do about it but it eliminate the hh so it will only show the minutes, seconds, and milliseconds.

Guillaume Barré · Answer 3 · 2014-06-25T22:45:10.957

Try this if you just want your elapsed time in HH:MM:SS, this works even if you have more than 24 hours.

timeTextView.setText("Time: " + convertMillis(System.currentTimeMillis() - runTime));
...
public static String convertMillis(long milliseconds){  
    long time = milliseconds / 1000;  
    String seconds = Integer.toString((int)(time % 60));  
    String minutes = Integer.toString((int)((time % 3600) / 60));  
    String hours = Integer.toString((int)(time / 3600));  
    for (int i = 0; i < 2; i++) {  
        if (seconds.length() < 2) {  
            seconds = "0" + seconds;  
        }  
        if (minutes.length() < 2) {  
            minutes = "0" + minutes;  
        }  
        if (hours.length() < 2) {  
            hours = "0" + hours;  
         }  
    }  
    return(hours + ":" + minutes + ":" + seconds);  
}

Format error of time difference

3 Answers3