Need to get current timestamp in Java

Question

I need to get the current timestamp in Java, with the format of MM/DD/YYYY h:mm:ss AM/PM,

For example: 06/01/2000 10:01:50 AM

I need it to be Threadsafe as well.

Can I utilize something like this?

java.util.Date date = new java.util.Date(); System.out.println(new Timestamp(date.getTime())); 

Or the examples discussed at the link here.

Answer 1

The threadunsafety of SimpleDateFormat should not be an issue if you just create it inside the very same method block as you use it. In other words, you are not assigning it as static or instance variable of a class and reusing it in one or more methods which can be invoked by multiple threads. Only this way the threadunsafety of SimpleDateFormat will be exposed. You can however safely reuse the same SimpleDateFormat instance within the very same method block as it would be accessed by the current thread only.

Also, the java.sql.Timestamp class which you're using there should not be abused as it's specific to the JDBC API in order to be able to store or retrieve a TIMESTAMP/DATETIME column type in a SQL database and convert it from/to java.util.Date.

So, this should do:

Date date = new Date(); SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yyyy h:mm:ss a"); String formattedDate = sdf.format(date); System.out.println(formattedDate); // 12/01/2011 4:48:16 PM 

Answer 2

Print a Timestamp in java, using the java.sql.Timestamp.

import java.sql.Timestamp; import java.util.Date;  public class GetCurrentTimeStamp {     public static void main( String[] args ){         java.util.Date date= new java.util.Date();         System.out.println(new Timestamp(date.getTime()));     } } 

This prints:

2014-08-07 17:34:16.664 

Print a Timestamp in Java using SimpleDateFormat on a one-liner.

import java.util.Date; import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;  class Runner{     public static void main(String[] args){          System.out.println(             new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm:ss").format(new Date()));      }  } 

Prints:

08/14/2014 14:10:38 

Java date format legend:

G Era designation      Text               AD y Year                 Year               1996; 96 M Month in year        Month              July; Jul; 07 w Week in year         Number             27 W Week in month        Number             2 D Day in year          Number             189 d Day in month         Number             10 F Day of week in month Number             2 E Day in week          Text               Tuesday; Tue a Am/pm marker         Text               PM H Hour in day (0-23)   Number             0 k Hour in day (1-24)   Number             24 K Hour in am/pm (0-11) Number             0 h Hour in am/pm (1-12) Number             12 m Minute in hour       Number             30 s Second in minute     Number             55 S Millisecond          Number             978 z Time zone            General time zone  Pacific Standard Time; PST; GMT-08:00 Z Time zone            RFC 822 time zone  -0800