The main API for dates, times, instants, and durations.
The main API for dates, times, instants, and durations.
The classes defined here represent the principal date-time concepts, including instants, durations, dates, times, time-zones and periods. They are based on the ISO calendar system, which is the de facto world calendar following the proleptic Gregorian rules. All the classes are immutable and thread-safe.
Each date time instance is composed of fields that are conveniently made available by the APIs.
For lower level access to the fields refer to the org.threeten.bp.temporal
package. Each
class includes support for printing and parsing all manner of dates and times. Refer to the
org.threeten.bp.format
package for customization options.
The org.threeten.bp.chrono
package contains the calendar neutral API. This is intended
for use by applications that need to use localized calendars. It is recommended that applications
use the ISO-8601 dates and time classes from this package across system boundaries, such as to
the database or across the network. The calendar neutral API should be reserved for interactions
with users.
org.threeten.bp.Instant
is essentially a numeric timestamp. The current Instant can be
retrieved from a org.threeten.bp.Clock
. This is useful for logging and persistence of a
point in time and has in the past been associated with storing the result from java.lang.System#currentTimeMillis()
.
org.threeten.bp.LocalDate
stores a date without a time. This stores a date like
'2010-12-03' and could be used to store a birthday.
org.threeten.bp.LocalTime
stores a time without a date. This stores a time like '11:30'
and could be used to store an opening or closing time.
org.threeten.bp.LocalDateTime
stores a date and time. This stores a date-time like
'2010-12-03T11:30'.
org.threeten.bp.OffsetTime
stores a time and offset from UTC without a date. This stores
a date like '11:30+01:00'. The ZoneOffset
is of the form
'+01:00'.
org.threeten.bp.OffsetDateTime
stores a date and time and offset from UTC. This stores a
date-time like '2010-12-03T11:30+01:00'. This is sometimes found in XML messages and other forms
of persistence, but contains less information than a full time-zone.
org.threeten.bp.ZonedDateTime
stores a date and time with a time-zone. This is useful if
you want to perform accurate calculations of dates and times taking into account the org.threeten.bp.ZoneId
, such as 'Europe/Paris'. Where possible, it is recommended to use a
simpler class. The widespread use of time-zones tends to add considerable complexity to an
application.
Beyond dates and times, the API also allows the storage of period and durations of time. A org.threeten.bp.Duration
is a simple measure of time along the time-line in nanoseconds. A
org.threeten.bp.Period
expresses an amount of time in units meaningful to humans, such as
years or hours.
org.threeten.bp.Year
stores a year on its own. This stores a single year in isolation,
such as '2010'.
org.threeten.bp.YearMonth
stores a year and month without a day or time. This stores a
year and month, such as '2010-12' and could be used for a credit card expiry.
org.threeten.bp.MonthDay
stores a month and day without a year or time. This stores a
month and day-of-month, such as '--12-03' and could be used to store an annual event like a
birthday without storing the year.
org.threeten.bp.Month
stores a month on its own. This stores a single month-of-year in
isolation, such as 'DECEMBER'.
org.threeten.bp.DayOfWeek
stores a day-of-week on its own. This stores a single
day-of-week in isolation, such as 'TUESDAY'.