How to format convert the string 2013-01-27T02:31:

Question

I have tried many times to convert the string 2013-01-27T02:31:47+08:00 into NSDate. I have found the formatting guide by apple and copied its code and tried , but it doesn't work.

 NSDateFormatter *rfc3339DateFormatter = [[NSDateFormatter alloc] init];
    NSLocale *enUSPOSIXLocale = [[NSLocale alloc] initWithLocaleIdentifier:@"en_US_POSIX"];

    [rfc3339DateFormatter setLocale:enUSPOSIXLocale];
    [rfc3339DateFormatter setDateFormat:@"yyyy'-'MM'-'dd'T'HH':'mm':'ss'Z'"];
    [rfc3339DateFormatter setTimeZone:[NSTimeZone timeZoneForSecondsFromGMT:8]];

    // Convert the RFC 3339 date time string to an NSDate.
    NSDate *date = [rfc3339DateFormatter dateFromString:@"2013-01-27T02:31:47+08:00"];

Answer 1

  NSDateFormatter *dateFormat = [[NSDateFormatter alloc] init];
  [dateFormat setDateFormat:@"yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss"];
  [dateFormat setTimeZone:[NSTimeZone timeZoneForSecondsFromGMT:0]];

  NSString *dateTimeString = @"2013-01-09 16:00:00";
  NSLog(@"DateTimeString = %@", dateTimeString);

  NSDate *myDate =[dateFormat dateFromString:dateTimeString];
  NSLog(@"myDate:          %@", myDate);

Output:

  dateTimeString = 2013-01-09 16:00:00
  myDate:        = 2013-01-09 16:00:00 +0000

To present a date to the user, convert NSDate to NSString, using stringFromDate, but do not set a time zone (so that the local time zone is used):

   NSDateFormatter *dateFormat2 = [[NSDateFormatter alloc] init];
   [dateFormat2 setDateFormat:@"yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss"];

     NSString *localDateString = [dateFormat2 stringFromDate:myDate];
   NSLog(@"localDateString: %@", localDateString);

Output:

   localDateString: 2013-01-09 17:00:00

Answer 2

Your format should be @"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ssZZZZZ". You only need single quotes around letters that are not going to be used by the formatter.