SimpleDateFormat.parse() ignores the number of characters in pattern

Question

I\'m trying to parse a date String which can have tree different formats. Even though the String should not match the second pattern it somehow does and therefore returns a

Answer 1

A workaround could be to test the yyyy-MM-dd format with a regex:

public static Date parseDate(String dateString) throws ParseException {
    SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("dd.MM.yyyy");
    SimpleDateFormat sdf2 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MM-yyyy");
    SimpleDateFormat sdf3 = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd");

    Date parsedDate;
    try {
        if (dateString.matches("\\d{4}-\\d{2}-\\d{2}")) {
            parsedDate = sdf3.parse(dateString);
        } else {
            throw new ParseException("", 0);
        }
    } catch (ParseException ex) {
        try {
            parsedDate = sdf2.parse(dateString);
        } catch (ParseException ex2) {
            parsedDate = sdf.parse(dateString);
        }
    }
    return parsedDate;
}