Parsing Java String into GMT Date

Question

I'm trying to parse a String that represents a date using GMT, but it prints out in my timezone on my PC (pacific). When I run the below I get the below output. Any ideas on how to get the parse to parse and return a GMT date? If you look below I'm setting the timezone using format.setTimeZone(TimeZone.getTimeZone("GMT")); but its not producing the desired result.

output from below code:

Mon Oct 29 05:57:00 PDT 2012

 package javaapplication1;

    import java.text.ParseException;
    import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
    import java.util.TimeZone;


    public class JavaApplication1 {

        public static void main(String[] args) throws ParseException {
            SimpleDateFormat format = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ssZ");
            format.setTimeZone(TimeZone.getTimeZone("GMT"));
            System.out.println(format.parse("2012-10-29T12:57:00-0000"));
        }
    }

Answer 1

You are using format.setTimeZone(TimeZone.getTimeZone("GMT")); in the formatter, which is being used in formatting the string into date i.e.

      Date date = format.parse("2012-10-29T12:57:00-0000");

is parsed treating 2012-10-29T12:57:00-0000 was a GMT value, but you are printing date which uses local timezome in printing hence you are noticing the difference.

If you want to print the date back in GMT, please use:

    String formattedDate = format.format(date);

and print the formattedDate. This will be GMT.

    System.out.println(formattedDate);