SimpleDateFormat

[Alik Elzin]

I want ot create a new instance of SimpleDateFormat with a pattern, which the user of the program gave. How do I know the pattern, given by the user, is a valid one ?
Thanks.
Alik

[Rene Larsen]

Are you not able to pre-define the pattern, so that the user only have the 'right' ones to choose from?
Rene

[Avi Abrami]

Hi Alik,
Unless I am misinterpreting your question, what (I think) you need is the "applyPattern()" method (of class "java.text.SimpleDateFormat"). It throws an exception if the supplied pattern is invalid. Please check the javadocs for more details.
Hope this has helped you.
Good Luck,
Avi.

[Alik Elzin]

Hi Rene,
thanks for the advise, but I want to give the user a free hand to choose his format.

[Alik Elzin]

Hi Avi,
I looked at the javadocs on java.text.SimpleDateFormat.applyPattern() and the method is not throwing an exception.
Thanks for the effort.

[Rene Larsen]

In the javadoc for SDK 1.4.x it throws an exception.
Rene

[Jim Yingst]

Alik - look again. It throws IllegalArgumentException. Since this is a subclass of RuntimeException it's not required to be declared in a throws clause - but the javadoc does document it anyway, using the @exception tag.
[ January 01, 2003: Message edited by: Jim Yingst ]

[Alik Elzin]

Sorry for not writting this earlier, but I'm using JDK 1.3.1.
The method applyPattern() in JDK 1.3.1 does not throw an exception.
Can you give a way to valid the pattern in JDK 1.3.1 ?

[Jim Yingst]

    SimpleDateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat();
    try { df.applyPattern("this is not a valid pattern"); }
    catch (IllegalArgumentException e)
    {
      System.out.println("Look, an undocumented exception: " + e);
    }