Using java.util.Date for comparison

[vikram karne]

Hi Friends

I am stuck in a problem for which i need help from you.

I have written code to convert a date object into a calander object for a functionality in my application.

I am getting the output in the following format after conversion
Thu May 31 00:00:00 IST 2007
Wed Jun 13 00:00:00 IST 2007


Now inside other method i reconvert the calendar object back to Date objects.the code is as below.
Date start=filterStartDate.getTime();
Date end=filterEndDate.getTime();

Now i need to compare the 2 Date objects here and check whether the startdate is less than enddate.
the date objects are again in the same format after conversion
Thu May 31 00:00:00 IST 2007
Wed Jun 13 00:00:00 IST 2007

Can anybody let me know how to do this conversion.If possible provide me piece of code to do it.
waiting for a positive reply from you side.

Regards
Vikeng

[Joanne Neal]

The Date class implements the Comparable interface so you can just do

start.compareTo(end)

which will return a value less than zero if start is earlier than end.
[ June 13, 2007: Message edited by: Joanne Neal ]

[Jesper de Jong]

Have you looked at the API documentation of class java.util.Date? It contains methods before() and after() that you can use.

if (startDate.before(endDate)) {
    System.out.println("OK");
}
else {
    System.out.println("Start date is not before end date!");
}