How to format Joda-Time DateTime to only mm/dd/yyyy?

Question

I have a string "11/15/2013 08:00:00", I want to format it to "11/15/2013", what is the correct DateTimeFormatter pattern?

I've tried many and googled and still unable to find the correct pattern.

edit: I am looking for Joda-Time DateTimeFormatter, not Java's SimpleDateFormat..

Answer 1

Note that in JAVA SE 8 a new java.time (JSR-310) package was introduced. This replaces Joda time, Joda users are advised to migrate. For the JAVA SE ≥ 8 way of formatting date and time, see below.

Joda time

Create a DateTimeFormatter using DateTimeFormat.forPattern(String)

Using Joda time you would do it like this:

String dateTime = "11/15/2013 08:00:00";
// Format for input
DateTimeFormatter dtf = DateTimeFormat.forPattern("MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm:ss");
// Parsing the date
DateTime jodatime = dtf.parseDateTime(dateTime);
// Format for output
DateTimeFormatter dtfOut = DateTimeFormat.forPattern("MM/dd/yyyy");
// Printing the date
System.out.println(dtfOut.print(jodatime));

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Standard Java ≥ 8

Java 8 introduced a new Date and Time library, making it easier to deal with dates and times. If you want to use standard Java version 8 or beyond, you would use a DateTimeFormatter. Since you don't have a time zone in your String, a java.time.LocalDateTime or a LocalDate, otherwise the time zoned varieties ZonedDateTime and ZonedDate could be used.

// Format for input
DateTimeFormatter inputFormat = DateTimeFormatter.ofPattern("MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm:ss");
// Parsing the date
LocalDate date = LocalDate.parse(dateTime, inputFormat);
// Format for output
DateTimeFormatter outputFormat = DateTimeFormatter.ofPattern("MM/dd/yyyy");
// Printing the date
System.out.println(date.format(outputFormat));

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Standard Java < 8

Before Java 8, you would use the a SimpleDateFormat and java.util.Date

String dateTime = "11/15/2013 08:00:00";
// Format for input
SimpleDateFormat dateParser = new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm:ss");
// Parsing the date
Date date7 = dateParser.parse(dateTime);
// Format for output
SimpleDateFormat dateFormatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yyyy");
// Printing the date
System.out.println(dateFormatter.format(date7));