Develop Reference

Check to see if current time is 00:00:00 [duplicate]

How can I get the current time and date in an Android app?

You could use:
import java.util.Calendar;
import java.util.Date;
Date currentTime = Calendar.getInstance().getTime();
There are plenty of constants in Calendar for everything you need.
Check the Calendar class documentation.

You can (but no longer should - see below!) use android.text.format.Time:
Time now = new Time();
now.setToNow();
From the reference linked above:
The Time class is a faster replacement
for the java.util.Calendar and
java.util.GregorianCalendar classes.
An instance of the Time class
represents a moment in time, specified
with second precision.
NOTE 1:
It's been several years since I wrote this answer,
and it is about an old, Android-specific and now deprecated class.
Google now says that
"[t]his class has a number of issues and it is recommended that GregorianCalendar is used instead".
NOTE 2: Even though the Time class has a toMillis(ignoreDaylightSavings) method, this is merely a convenience to pass to methods that expect time in milliseconds. The time value is only precise to one second; the milliseconds portion is always 000. If in a loop you do
Time time = new Time(); time.setToNow();
Log.d("TIME TEST", Long.toString(time.toMillis(false)));
... do something that takes more than one millisecond, but less than one second ...
The resulting sequence will repeat the same value, such as 1410543204000, until the next second has started, at which time 1410543205000 will begin to repeat.

If you want to get the date and time in a specific pattern you can use the following:
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyyMMdd_HHmmss", Locale.getDefault());
String currentDateandTime = sdf.format(new Date());
Or,
Date:
String currentDate = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MM-yyyy", Locale.getDefault()).format(new Date());
Time:
String currentTime = new SimpleDateFormat("HH:mm:ss", Locale.getDefault()).format(new Date());

For those who might rather prefer a customized format, you can use:
DateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("EEE, d MMM yyyy, HH:mm");
String date = df.format(Calendar.getInstance().getTime());
Whereas you can have DateFormat patterns such as:
"yyyy.MM.dd G 'at' HH:mm:ss z" ---- 2001.07.04 AD at 12:08:56 PDT
"hh 'o''clock' a, zzzz" ----------- 12 o'clock PM, Pacific Daylight Time
"EEE, d MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss Z"------- Wed, 4 Jul 2001 12:08:56 -0700
"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ"------- 2001-07-04T12:08:56.235-0700
"yyMMddHHmmssZ"-------------------- 010704120856-0700
"K:mm a, z" ----------------------- 0:08 PM, PDT
"h:mm a" -------------------------- 12:08 PM
"EEE, MMM d, ''yy" ---------------- Wed, Jul 4, '01

Actually, it's safer to set the current timezone set on the device with Time.getCurrentTimezone(), or else you will get the current time in UTC.
Time today = new Time(Time.getCurrentTimezone());
today.setToNow();
Then, you can get all the date fields you want, like, for example:
textViewDay.setText(today.monthDay + ""); // Day of the month (1-31)
textViewMonth.setText(today.month + ""); // Month (0-11)
textViewYear.setText(today.year + ""); // Year
textViewTime.setText(today.format("%k:%M:%S")); // Current time
See android.text.format.Time class for all the details.
UPDATE
As many people are pointing out, Google says this class has a number of issues and is not supposed to be used anymore:
This class has a number of issues and it is recommended that
GregorianCalendar is used instead.
Known issues:
For historical reasons when performing time calculations all
arithmetic currently takes place using 32-bit integers. This limits
the reliable time range representable from 1902 until 2037.See the
wikipedia article on the Year 2038 problem for details. Do not rely on
this behavior; it may change in the future. Calling
switchTimezone(String) on a date that cannot exist, such as a wall
time that was skipped due to a DST transition, will result in a date
in 1969 (i.e. -1, or 1 second before 1st Jan 1970 UTC). Much of the
formatting / parsing assumes ASCII text and is therefore not suitable
for use with non-ASCII scripts.

tl;dr
Instant.now() // Current moment in UTC.
…or…
ZonedDateTime.now( ZoneId.of( "America/Montreal" ) ) // In a particular time zone
Details
The other answers, while correct, are outdated. The old date-time classes have proven to be poorly designed, confusing, and troublesome.
java.time
Those old classes have been supplanted by the java.time framework.
Java 8 and later: The java.time framework is built-in.
Java 7 & 6: Use the backport of java.time.
Android: Use this wrapped version of that backport.
These new classes are inspired by the highly successful Joda-Time project, defined by JSR 310, and extended by the ThreeTen-Extra project.
See the Oracle Tutorial.
Instant
An Instant is a moment on the timeline in UTC with resolution up to nanoseconds.
Instant instant = Instant.now(); // Current moment in UTC.
Time Zone
Apply a time zone (ZoneId) to get a ZonedDateTime. If you omit the time zone your JVM’s current default time zone is implicitly applied. Better to specify explicitly the desired/expected time zone.
Use proper time zone names in the format of continent/region such as America/Montreal, Europe/Brussels, or Asia/Kolkata. Never use the 3-4 letter abbreviations such as EST or IST as they are neither standardized nor unique.
ZoneId zoneId = ZoneId.of( "America/Montreal" ); // Or "Asia/Kolkata", "Europe/Paris", and so on.
ZonedDateTime zdt = ZonedDateTime.ofInstant( instant , zoneId );
Generating Strings
You can easily generate a String as a textual representation of the date-time value. You can go with a standard format, your own custom format, or an automatically localized format.
ISO 8601
You can call the toString methods to get text formatted using the common and sensible ISO 8601 standard.
String output = instant.toString();
2016-03-23T03:09:01.613Z
Note that for ZonedDateTime, the toString method extends the ISO 8601 standard by appending the name of the time zone in square brackets. Extremely useful and important information, but not standard.
2016-03-22T20:09:01.613-08:00[America/Los_Angeles]
Custom format
Or specify your own particular formatting pattern with the DateTimeFormatter class.
DateTimeFormatter formatter = DateTimeFormatter.ofPattern( "dd/MM/yyyy hh:mm a" );
Specify a Locale for a human language (English, French, etc.) to use in translating the name of day/month and also in defining cultural norms such as the order of year and month and date. Note that Locale has nothing to do with time zone.
formatter = formatter.withLocale( Locale.US ); // Or Locale.CANADA_FRENCH or such.
String output = zdt.format( formatter );
Localizing
Better yet, let java.time do the work of localizing automatically.
DateTimeFormatter formatter = DateTimeFormatter.ofLocalizedDateTime( FormatStyle.MEDIUM );
String output = zdt.format( formatter.withLocale( Locale.US ) ); // Or Locale.CANADA_FRENCH and so on.
About java.time
The java.time framework is built into Java 8 and later. These classes supplant the troublesome old legacy date-time classes such as java.util.Date, Calendar, & SimpleDateFormat.
To learn more, see the Oracle Tutorial. And search Stack Overflow for many examples and explanations. Specification is JSR 310.
The Joda-Time project, now in maintenance mode, advises migration to the java.time classes.
You may exchange java.time objects directly with your database. Use a JDBC driver compliant with JDBC 4.2 or later. No need for strings, no need for java.sql.* classes. Hibernate 5 & JPA 2.2 support java.time.
Where can the java.time classes be obtained?
Java SE 8, Java SE 9, Java SE 10, Java SE 11, and later - Part of the standard Java API with a bundled implementation.
Java 9 brought some minor features and fixes.
Java SE 6 and Java SE 7
Most of the java.time functionality is back-ported to Java 6 & 7 in ThreeTen-Backport.
Android
Later versions of Android (26+) bundle implementations of the java.time classes.
For earlier Android (<26), the process of API desugaring brings a subset of the java.time functionality not originally built into Android.
If the desugaring does not offer what you need, the ThreeTenABP project adapts ThreeTen-Backport (mentioned above) to Android. See How to use ThreeTenABP….

For the current date and time, use:
String mydate = java.text.DateFormat.getDateTimeInstance().format(Calendar.getInstance().getTime());
Which outputs:
Feb 27, 2012 5:41:23 PM

Try with the following way. All formats are given below to get the date and time formats.
Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();
SimpleDateFormat dateformat = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MMM-yyyy hh:mm:ss aa");
String datetime = dateformat.format(c.getTime());
System.out.println(datetime);

To ge the current time you can use System.currentTimeMillis() which is standard in Java. Then you can use it to create a date
Date currentDate = new Date(System.currentTimeMillis());
And as mentioned by others to create a time
Time currentTime = new Time();
currentTime.setToNow();

You can use the code:
Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss");
String strDate = sdf.format(c.getTime());
Output:
2014-11-11 00:47:55
You also get some more formatting options for SimpleDateFormat from here.

Easy. You can dissect the time to get separate values for current time, as follows:
Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance();
int millisecond = cal.get(Calendar.MILLISECOND);
int second = cal.get(Calendar.SECOND);
int minute = cal.get(Calendar.MINUTE);
// 12-hour format
int hour = cal.get(Calendar.HOUR);
// 24-hour format
int hourofday = cal.get(Calendar.HOUR_OF_DAY);
Same goes for the date, as follows:
Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance();
int dayofyear = cal.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_YEAR);
int year = cal.get(Calendar.YEAR);
int dayofweek = cal.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_WEEK);
int dayofmonth = cal.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_MONTH);

SimpleDateFormat databaseDateTimeFormate = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss");
SimpleDateFormat databaseDateFormate = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd");
SimpleDateFormat sdf1 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd.MM.yy");
SimpleDateFormat sdf2 = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy.MM.dd G 'at' hh:mm:ss z");
SimpleDateFormat sdf3 = new SimpleDateFormat("EEE, MMM d, ''yy");
SimpleDateFormat sdf4 = new SimpleDateFormat("h:mm a");
SimpleDateFormat sdf5 = new SimpleDateFormat("h:mm");
SimpleDateFormat sdf6 = new SimpleDateFormat("H:mm:ss:SSS");
SimpleDateFormat sdf7 = new SimpleDateFormat("K:mm a,z");
SimpleDateFormat sdf8 = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy.MMMMM.dd GGG hh:mm aaa");
String currentDateandTime = databaseDateTimeFormate.format(new Date()); //2009-06-30 08:29:36
String currentDateandTime = databaseDateFormate.format(new Date()); //2009-06-30
String currentDateandTime = sdf1.format(new Date()); //30.06.09
String currentDateandTime = sdf2.format(new Date()); //2009.06.30 AD at 08:29:36 PDT
String currentDateandTime = sdf3.format(new Date()); //Tue, Jun 30, '09
String currentDateandTime = sdf4.format(new Date()); //8:29 PM
String currentDateandTime = sdf5.format(new Date()); //8:29
String currentDateandTime = sdf6.format(new Date()); //8:28:36:249
String currentDateandTime = sdf7.format(new Date()); //8:29 AM,PDT
String currentDateandTime = sdf8.format(new Date()); //2009.June.30 AD 08:29 AM
Date format Patterns
G Era designator (before christ, after christ)
y Year (e.g. 12 or 2012). Use either yy or yyyy.
M Month in year. Number of M's determine length of format (e.g. MM, MMM or MMMMM)
d Day in month. Number of d's determine length of format (e.g. d or dd)
h Hour of day, 1-12 (AM / PM) (normally hh)
H Hour of day, 0-23 (normally HH)
m Minute in hour, 0-59 (normally mm)
s Second in minute, 0-59 (normally ss)
S Millisecond in second, 0-999 (normally SSS)
E Day in week (e.g Monday, Tuesday etc.)
D Day in year (1-366)
F Day of week in month (e.g. 1st Thursday of December)
w Week in year (1-53)
W Week in month (0-5)
a AM / PM marker
k Hour in day (1-24, unlike HH's 0-23)
K Hour in day, AM / PM (0-11)
z Time Zone

For the current date and time with format, use:
In Java
Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss");
String strDate = sdf.format(c.getTime());
Log.d("Date", "DATE: " + strDate)
In Kotlin
if (Build.VERSION.SDK_INT >= Build.VERSION_CODES.O) {
val current = LocalDateTime.now()
val formatter = DateTimeFormatter.ofPattern("dd.MM.yyyy. HH:mm:ss")
var myDate: String = current.format(formatter)
Log.d("Date", "DATE: " + myDate)
} else {
var date = Date()
val formatter = SimpleDateFormat("MMM dd yyyy HH:mma")
val myDate: String = formatter.format(date)
Log.d("Date", "DATE: " + myDate)
}
Date formatter patterns
"yyyy.MM.dd G 'at' HH:mm:ss z" ---- 2001.07.04 AD at 12:08:56 PDT
"hh 'o''clock' a, zzzz" ----------- 12 o'clock PM, Pacific Daylight Time
"EEE, d MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss Z"------- Wed, 4 Jul 2001 12:08:56 -0700
"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ"------- 2001-07-04T12:08:56.235-0700
"yyMMddHHmmssZ"-------------------- 010704120856-0700
"K:mm a, z" ----------------------- 0:08 PM, PDT
"h:mm a" -------------------------- 12:08 PM
"EEE, MMM d, ''yy" ---------------- Wed, Jul 4, '01

final Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();
int mYear = c.get(Calendar.YEAR);
int mMonth = c.get(Calendar.MONTH);
int mDay = c.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_MONTH);
textView.setText("" + mDay + "-" + mMonth + "-" + mYear);

This is a method that will be useful to get date and time:
private String getDate(){
DateFormat dfDate = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy/MM/dd");
String date=dfDate.format(Calendar.getInstance().getTime());
DateFormat dfTime = new SimpleDateFormat("HH:mm");
String time = dfTime.format(Calendar.getInstance().getTime());
return date + " " + time;
}
You can call this method and get the current date and time values:
2017/01//09 19:23

If you need the current date:
Calendar cc = Calendar.getInstance();
int year = cc.get(Calendar.YEAR);
int month = cc.get(Calendar.MONTH);
int mDay = cc.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_MONTH);
System.out.println("Date", year + ":" + month + ":" + mDay);
If you need the current time:
int mHour = cc.get(Calendar.HOUR_OF_DAY);
int mMinute = cc.get(Calendar.MINUTE);
System.out.println("time_format" + String.format("%02d:%02d", mHour , mMinute));

You can also use android.os.SystemClock.
For example SystemClock.elapsedRealtime() will give you more accurate time readings when the phone is asleep.

SimpleDateFormat dateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy/MM/dd HH:mm:ss");
Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance();
System.out.println("time => " + dateFormat.format(cal.getTime()));
String time_str = dateFormat.format(cal.getTime());
String[] s = time_str.split(" ");
for (int i = 0; i < s.length; i++) {
System.out.println("date => " + s[i]);
}
int year_sys = Integer.parseInt(s[0].split("/")[0]);
int month_sys = Integer.parseInt(s[0].split("/")[1]);
int day_sys = Integer.parseInt(s[0].split("/")[2]);
int hour_sys = Integer.parseInt(s[1].split(":")[0]);
int min_sys = Integer.parseInt(s[1].split(":")[1]);
System.out.println("year_sys => " + year_sys);
System.out.println("month_sys => " + month_sys);
System.out.println("day_sys => " + day_sys);
System.out.println("hour_sys => " + hour_sys);
System.out.println("min_sys => " + min_sys);

Use:
Time time = new Time();
time.setToNow();
System.out.println("time: " + time.hour + ":" + time.minute);
This will give you, for example, "12:32".
Remember to import android.text.format.Time;.

You can simply use the following code:
DateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("HH:mm"); // Format time
String time = df.format(Calendar.getInstance().getTime());
DateFormat df1 = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy/MM/dd"); // Format date
String date = df1.format(Calendar.getInstance().getTime());

Current time and date in Android with the format
Calendar c = Calendar.getInstance();
System.out.println("Current dateTime => " + c.getTime());
SimpleDateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MM-yyyy HH:mm:ss a");
String formattedDate = df.format(c.getTime());
System.out.println("Format dateTime => " + formattedDate);
Output
I/System.out: Current dateTime => Wed Feb 26 02:58:17 GMT+05:30 2020
I/System.out: Format dateTime => 26-02-2020 02:58:17 AM

For a customized time and date format:
SimpleDateFormat dateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ssZZZZZ",Locale.ENGLISH);
String cDateTime = dateFormat.format(new Date());
The output is in this format:
2015-06-18T10:15:56-05:00

Time now = new Time();
now.setToNow();
Try this works for me as well.

You can obtain the date by using:
Time t = new Time(Time.getCurrentTimezone());
t.setToNow();
String date = t.format("%Y/%m/%d");
This will give you a result in a nice form, as in this example: "2014/02/09".

Well, I had problems with some answers by the API, so I fused this code:
Time t = new Time(Time.getCurrentTimezone());
t.setToNow();
String date1 = t.format("%Y/%m/%d");
Date date = new Date(System.currentTimeMillis());
SimpleDateFormat dateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("hh:mm aa", Locale.ENGLISH);
String var = dateFormat.format(date);
String horafecha = var+ " - " + date1;
tvTime.setText(horafecha);
Output:
03:25 PM - 2017/10/03

Java
Long date=System.currentTimeMillis();
SimpleDateFormat dateFormat =new SimpleDateFormat("dd / MMMM / yyyy - HH:mm", Locale.getDefault());
String dateStr = dateFormat.format(date);
Kotlin
date if milliseconds and 13 digits(hex to date)
val date=System.currentTimeMillis() //here the date comes in 13 digits
val dtlong = Date(date)
val sdfdate = SimpleDateFormat(pattern, Locale.getDefault()).format(dtlong)
Date Formatter
"dd / MMMM / yyyy - HH:mm" -> 29 / April / 2022 - 12:03
"dd / MM / yyyy" -> 29 / 03 / 2022
"dd / MMM / yyyy" -> 29 / Mar / 2022 (shortens the month)
"EEE, d MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss" -> Wed, 4 Jul 2022 12:08:56

Date todayDate = new Date();
todayDate.getDay();
todayDate.getHours();
todayDate.getMinutes();
todayDate.getMonth();
todayDate.getTime();

Try This
String mytime = (DateFormat.format("dd-MM-yyyy hh:mm:ss", new java.util.Date()).toString());

You should use the Calender class according to the new API. The Date class is deprecated now.
Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance();
String date = "" + cal.get(Calendar.DATE) + "-" + (cal.get(Calendar.MONTH)+1) + "-" + cal.get(Calendar.YEAR);
String time = "" + cal.get(Calendar.HOUR_OF_DAY) + ":" + cal.get(Calendar.MINUTE);

The below method will return the current date and time in a String, Use a different time zone according to your actual time zone. I've used GMT.
public static String GetToday(){
Date presentTime_Date = Calendar.getInstance().getTime();
SimpleDateFormat dateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss");
dateFormat.setTimeZone(TimeZone.getTimeZone("GMT"));
return dateFormat.format(presentTime_Date);
}

Cannot parse date string containing three letter month

I spent about hour to solve problem, but I couldn't...
My date string is "06 Jan 2016", and I want to parse it to object Date.
I tried next method
SimpleDateFormat frmt2 = new SimpleDateFormat("dd MMM yyyy");
Date date = frmt2.parse("06 Jan 2016");
And I got:
java.text.ParseException: Unparseable date: "06 Jan 2016" (at offset 3)
I tried Joda lib
DateTimeFormatter formatter = DateTimeFormat.forPattern("dd MMM yyyy");
DateTime dt = formatter.parseDateTime("06 Jan 2016");
But I got same error:
Invalid format: "06 Jan 2016" is malformed at "Jan 2016"
Can you help me please to obtain the success in this simple problem.
Thank you very much.

SimpleDateFormat format = new SimpleDateFormat("MMM dd,yyyy hh:mm", Locale.ENGLISH);
Date theDate = format.parse("JAN 13,2014 09:15");
Calendar myCal = new GregorianCalendar();
myCal.setTime(theDate);
System.out.println("Day: " + myCal.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_MONTH));
System.out.println("Month: " + myCal.get(Calendar.MONTH) + 1);
System.out.println("Year: " + myCal.get(Calendar.YEAR));

how to get date from 12 hour format to 24 hour format in android

hello I have date like..
String date="09:00 AM"
But I need 09:00:00
So I use following.
String date="09:00 AM"
SimpleDateFormat f1 = new SimpleDateFormat("hh:mm:ss");
Date d1= f1.parse(date);
But it give me parse exception.
Please help me to find this.
Thanks in advance.

That's not the correct format for parsing that date, you need something like:
"hh:mm a"
Once you have a date object, you can then use a different format to output it. The following code segment shows how:
import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Date;
String date = "09:27 PM";
SimpleDateFormat h_mm_a = new SimpleDateFormat("h:mm a");
SimpleDateFormat hh_mm_ss = new SimpleDateFormat("HH:mm:ss");
try {
Date d1 = h_mm_a.parse(date);
System.out.println (hh_mm_ss.format(d1));
} catch (Exception e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
This outputs:
21:27:00
as you would expect.

Date c = Calendar.getInstance().getTime();
//day of the month
//EEEE---full day name
//EEE- 3 chars of the day
SimpleDateFormat outFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("EEE");
String dayof_month = outFormat.format(c);
//date
//MMM--3 chars of month name
//MM--number of the month
SimpleDateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MMM-yyyy");
String formattedDate = df.format(c);
//time
//hh---12 hrs format
//HH---24 hrs format
// a stands for AM/PM
DateFormat date = new SimpleDateFormat("hh:mm:ss a");
String localTime = date.format(c);
login_date_text.setText(dayof_month +" , "+formattedDate);
login_time_text.setText(localTime);
Log.e("testing","date ==" +dayof_month +" , "+formattedDate);
Log.e("testing","time ==" +localTime);

Getting month in a string format

I want to show the date in format 22-Apr-2012.
I am using this code:
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MM-yyyy");
sdf.applyPattern("dd MMM yyyy");
Date x = new Date(time.year,time.month,time.monthday);
System.out.println(sdf.format(x));
But i am getting o/p as:
22 apr 3912.
I want to know why it is showing 3912 in place of 2012.

Please read the api for Date class. It starts from year 1900 so in this constructor you must provide the date - 1900. But this constructor is deprecated so my advice is to start using Calendar object for your date related operations.
for Java.da

Calendar cal=Calendar.getInstance();
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("dd MMM yyyy");
String dateresult = sdf.format(cal.getTime());

SimpleDateFormat dateformate = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MMM-yyyy");
Calendar currentDate = Calendar.getInstance();
String currentDateStr = dateformate.format(currentDate.getTime());
Log.i("Infoe ", " " + currentDateStr.toString());
System.out.println("Current date is : " + currentDateStr);
////=== OR
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MMM-yyyy");
sdf.applyPattern("dd-MMM-yyyy");
Date x = new Date(currentDate.get(Calendar.YEAR) - 1900,
currentDate.get(Calendar.MONTH), currentDate.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_MONTH));
Log.i("Infoe ", " " + sdf.format(x));
System.out.println(sdf.format(x));
its 3912 bcz ...date is setted like...
Calendar.set(year + 1900, month, date) or GregorianCalendar(year + 1900, month, date).
as per GregorianCalendar
i think use of calendar is gd as date is deprecated...
nd for date format use dd-MMM-yyyy no dd-MM-yyyy bcz you want month first 2 chars...
For date Format

how to format a date?

Hello I have been trying to format this date but it keeps giving me in unparsable date error? I am trying to get a time stamp like 2011-06-24T19:55:37Z to be June 24, 2011. here is the code I am using. Also on a side note is contraction (like the 1st, 2nd, 3rd) possible?
SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("MM d, yyyy", Locale.US);
Date dt = sdf.parse("2011-03-01T17:55:15Z");
time.setText("Time: " + dt.toString());

The problem is that the format provided to SimpleDateFormat's constructor doesn't match the format of your date.
The string MM d, yyyy tells SimpleDateFormat how to interpret 2011-03-01T17:55:15Z.
Building a format string is described in the docs.

This comes from another question within stackoverflow
Date date = new Date(location.getTime());
DateFormat dateFormat = android.text.format.DateFormat.getDateFormat(getApplicationContext());
mTimeText.setText("Time: " + dateFormat.format(date));
DateFormat formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-mm-dd HH:MM:SS -05:00");
Date date = (Date)formatter.parse("2011-06-24T19:55:37Z");
Make sure the SimpleDateFormat matches your string