Convert String to Calendar

[Lil_Aziz1]

I'm trying to convert a String to Calendar. This is my attempt:

String content = "Thu Aug 05 21:07:55 CDT 2010";
SimpleDateFormat format = new SimpleDateFormat("EEE MMM dd HH:mm:ss z yyyy");
format.applyPattern(content); //line 65
...
//my attempt stopped here because of Exception.

I end up getting this exception:

java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: Illegal pattern  character 'T'
	at java.text.SimpleDateFormat.translatePattern(Unknown Source)
	at java.text.SimpleDateFormat.applyLocalizedPattern(Unknown Source)
	at sudoku.SudokuWorld.getTimeOfLastExecution(SudokuWorld.java:65)
	at sudoku.SudokuWorld.<init>(SudokuWorld.java:28)
	at sudoku.DriverProgram.main(DriverProgram.java:5)

The only 'T' in the String content is T in Thu. Consequently, I decided to do this:

SimpleDateFormat format1 = new SimpleDateFormat("EEE");
format1.applyPattern("Wed"); //line 63

and evidently enough, I get an exception:

java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: Illegal pattern character 'e'
	at java.text.SimpleDateFormat.compile(Unknown Source)
	at java.text.SimpleDateFormat.applyPattern(Unknown Source)
	at sudoku.SudokuWorld.getTimeOfLastExecution(SudokuWorld.java:63)
	at sudoku.SudokuWorld.<init>(SudokuWorld.java:28)
	at sudoku.DriverProgram.main(DriverProgram.java:5)

Now when I do something like this:

SimpleDateFormat format1 = new SimpleDateFormat("mm/dd/yy");
format1.applyPattern("05/18/92");

I get no exception.

Anyone know what I'm doing wrong? Thanks in advance!

[Fubarable]

Look at the SimpleDateFormat class API. Are you sure you want to call toPattern(...) much less with a parameter?

[Lil_Aziz1]

Oh sorry. In my IDE it is applyPattern(). I manually typed it in here and did it incorrectly.

[Zack]

applyPattern is not used for this. Take a look at the documentation (SimpleDateFormat (Java 2 Platform SE v1.4.2)); it's used to convert a string like hh:mm:ss to 13:26:59.

EDIT: You're looking for something more like this:

long epoch = new java.text.SimpleDateFormat("dd/MM/yyyy HH:mm:ss").parse("01/01/1970 01:00:00");

(Source: http://www.epochconverter.com/)

[Tolls]

parse() returns a Date, not a long...
But yes, the OP should be using parse().

[Lil_Aziz1]

Oh dur.. applyPattern is to change this pattern. Thanks for the help!