SimpleDateFormat “Unparseable date” Exception

Question

I am trying to parse datetime string with SimpleDateFormat.parse() but I keep receiving Unparseable date exceptions.

Here is the date format I am trying

Answer 1

I am sure most of you got frustrated from the fact that SimpleDateFormat can not handle ISO8601 format. Here is my little trick to solve this nuisance.

Create a list of Know format you know that you will use for your application and apply SimpleDateFormat to the list. Now, in your formatDate() method, simple try all your known format and trap the Exception, then if still did not have a date, just use

Date d = javax.xml.bind.DatatypeConverter.parseDateTime("2013-06-28T00:00:00+00:00").getTime();
if (d == null)
try {
    SimpleDateFormater ...
}

to try it and see if that work. For more info Simple trick to convert Date format with timezone in Java!