How can I parse date in Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017 format in Java?

Question

I have tried the below code to parse the date in Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017 format. But, it is showing parsing exception. How can I parse the date format for Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017?

SimpleDateFormat sdf=new SimpleDateFormat("EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss zzzz yyyy");
Date bbDate=sdf.parse(String.valueOf("Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017"));
System.out.println(bbDate);

score 1 · Answer 1 · edited Apr 19 '17 at 19:27

1

You have an unhandled exception. You need to surround the parse line in a try-catch, or have the function itself throw an exception.

    SimpleDateFormat sdf=new SimpleDateFormat("EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss zzzz yyyy");

    try {
        Date bbDate = sdf.parse("Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017");
        System.out.println(bbDate);
    } catch (ParseException e) {
        // … Handle exception.
        System.out.println( "ERROR…" );
    }

Here is the documentation to learn more about Java exceptions. https://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/essential/exceptions/

edited Apr 19 '17 at 19:27

Basil Bourque

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answered Apr 19 '17 at 09:16

Robert

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Please, not even in a code snippet meant to explain something, or maybe particularly not here, *don’t* swallow an exception. – Ole V.V. Apr 19 '17 at 18:58

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Apr 19 '17 at 09:28

1

It is better to use new Java Date Time api: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/articles/java/jf14-date-time-2125367.html

You can do the same thing with the new api as follows:

ZonedDateTime.parse("Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017",
            DateTimeFormatter.ofPattern("EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss z yyyy")).toLocalDateTime();

answered Apr 19 '17 at 09:28

Ali Sağlam

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Why the call to `toLocalDateTime` at the end? You are discarding valuable time zone information for no reason. – Basil Bourque Apr 19 '17 at 19:29
You are right. I just wanted to show, how to get LocalDateTime instance ZonedDateTime. – Ali Sağlam Apr 20 '17 at 08:33

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Apr 19 '17 at 09:19

0

Its just not handled Parse Exception. Your SimpleDateFormat is good.

try {
        SimpleDateFormat sdf=new SimpleDateFormat("EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss zzzz yyyy");
        Date bbDate;
        bbDate = sdf.parse(String.valueOf("Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017"));
        System.out.println(bbDate);
    } catch (ParseException e) {
        // TODO Auto-generated catch block
        e.printStackTrace();
    }

answered Apr 19 '17 at 09:19

strash

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Well. I tried even with handling exceptions. Still no luck.I am still getting the same exception.Does this to do with the java version as I am using Java Version 6(1.6.0.29)? – M.Nehru Apr 19 '17 at 09:48
yes maybe it is from the java version. try switching to java 7 or java 8 – strash Apr 19 '17 at 09:52
they changed simpledateformat in java 7 i think – strash Apr 19 '17 at 09:53
In My application, We are using java 6 only. So, I need to parse the date in Java 6 format. – M.Nehru Apr 19 '17 at 10:22

Ole V.V. · Answer 4 · 2017-04-19T22:13:06.993

Since your string uses English names for week day and month, you need to make sure that your SimpleDateFormat uses a locale with English language, for example:

    SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss zzzz yyyy", Locale.ROOT);

With this change your code prints (tested with Java 8):

Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017

EDIT: please fill in the appropriate (English-speaking) locale instead of Locale.ROOT.

I agree with Ali Sağlam in warmly recommending the java.time classes introduced in Java 8. You will still need to control the locale, though:

    ZonedDateTime.parse("Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017",
                        DateTimeFormatter.ofPattern("EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss z yyyy",
                                                    Locale.ROOT))
            .toLocalDateTime();

Finally, while we’re at the recommendations, see if you can find a way to avoid the three and four letter time zone abbreviations like CEST. Many of them are ambiguous, and CEST isn’t even really a full time zone, just the summer half of the Central European time zone. While it works as expected with a date in the summer time half of year, I’m not even sure what I should expect if one day you have a date in winter with CEST time zone abbreviation.

Interesting question, @BasilBourque. I am routinely using `Locale.ROOT` to mean something like “the locale neutral locale”. For example, rather than passing a `null` for locale to `String.format()` I prefer to pass `Locale.ROOT` to mean “do not apply any localization”. In this case I was in doubt, but figured that the input String more likely came out of either `Date.toString()` or a corresponding non-locale-dependent source in some other system. If the string is in English because it comes from an English speaking locality, one should of course use the corresponding locale, not `ROOT`. — Ole V.V., Apr 19 '17 at 22:11

How can I parse date in Tue Apr 11 00:00:00 CEST 2017 format in Java?

4 Answers4