Android System Date And Time In Different Format

In this post we will see how to format system date and time for your android application,for getting current date and time in android application we use make use of Calender class of java.util package , the static method getInstance of Calender class returns the  instance of Calender and this object can produce all the time field values  needed to implement the date-time format

 Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();

After getting calendar Instance , we required a formatted object for date and time.

The SimpleDateFormat Class is used for setting the format , the constructor of this class takes the pattern describing what strings are to produced

SimpleDateFormat format = new SimpleDateFormat("dd:MMMM:yyyy HH:mm:ss ");
String formatdate=format(c.getTime());

file : activity_main.xml

<RelativeLayout
    xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    xmlns:tools="http://schemas.android.com/tools"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:paddingBottom="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    android:paddingLeft="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingRight="@dimen/activity_horizontal_margin"
    android:paddingTop="@dimen/activity_vertical_margin"
    tools:context=".MainActivity" >

    <TextView
        android:id="@+id/display"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text=""
        android:textSize="22sp" />

</RelativeLayout>

file : MainActivity

package com.example.sysdatetime;

import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Calendar;

import android.app.Activity;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.widget.Button;
import android.widget.TextView;

public class MainActivity extends Activity {

 TextView tv;
 Button btn;

 @Override
 protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
  super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
  setContentView(R.layout.activity_main);

  tv = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.display);

  Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();

  SimpleDateFormat format1, format2, format3, format4, format5;

  format1 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd:MM:yyyy:HH:mm:ss ");

  format2 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MM-yyyy-HH-mm-ss");

  format3 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MMMM-yyyy-HH-mm-ss");

  format4 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd/MMM/yyyy/HH/mm/ss");

  format5 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd_MM_yy_HH_mm_ss a");

  tv.setText(format1.format(c.getTime()) + "\n\n"
    + format2.format(c.getTime()) + "\n\n"
    + format3.format(c.getTime()) + "\n\n"
    + format4.format(c.getTime()) + "\n\n"
    + format5.format(c.getTime()));

 }
}

In this below table you can see the patterns description for date time and also the separator which is used for formatting.

Date format

Date Format	Description	Value
d	Single digit date eg 1	1
dd	double digit date eg 01	01
M	Single digit month eg: 1	1
MM	Double digit month eg: 01	01
MMM	three letter abbreviation for month ex: jan	jan
MMMM	month spelled out in full ex : january	january
yy	double digit year ex : 14	14
yyyy	four digit year ex : 2014	2014

Time Format

Time Format	Description	Value
h	single digit hours in 12hours format	9
hh	double digit hours in 12 hour format	09
H	single digit hours in 24 hour format	8AM as 8 8PM as 20
HH	double digit hours in 24 hour format	8AM as 08 8PM as 20
m	single digit minute	9
mm	double digit minute	09
s	single digit second	9
ss	double digit second	09
a	Marker	am/pm

Separator

Format	Description
" . "	Dots or full stops
" _ "	Hyphens or dashes
" "	Spaces
" : "	colon mostly used between time
" / "	Slash