Date/Time Plugin

The plugin provides functionality to generate, modify and validate date/time.

Installation

  1. Copy the below line to dependencies section of the project build.gradle file

    Example 1. build.gradle
    implementation(group: 'org.vividus', name: 'vividus-plugin-datetime', version: '0.5.1')

  2. If the project was imported to the IDE before adding new plugin, re-generate the configuration files for the used IDE and then refresh the project in the used IDE.

Properties

Required

There are no required properties for the plugin.

Optional

location.zone-id - Defines time zone which will be used. The default is set to a system default timezone. Time zone format

Expressions

The expression parameters marked with bold are mandatory.

generateDate

Generates the date using current date as a baseline.

 #{generateDate($period, $outputFormat)}

Properties

Property name Acceptable values Default Description

expression.generate-date.locale

2-letter language code followed by underscore _ and then 2-letter country code

en_US

The locale used for the resulting date.

For example, the date '2022-08-11' with format 'EEE, dd MMM yyyy' will be displayed as

  • 'Mon, 15 Aug 2022' for en_US locale

  • 'lun., 15 août 2022' for fr_FR locale

Let’s imagine the current date is 2020-11-23 and the time is 00:10:01. Here is a set of examples with the results and comments.

Table 1. Examples of the expressions generating dates
Expression Result Comment

#{generateDate(P)}

2020-11-23

Current date.

#{generateDate(P1DT2h)}

2020-11-24T02:10:01

Current date +1 day and +2 hours

#{generateDate(-P1D}

2020-11-23

Current date -1 day

#{generateDate(P1M)}

2020-12-23

Current date + 1 month

#{generateDate(-PT10M)}

2020-11-23T00:00:01

Current date time -10 mins

#{generateDate(P, yyyy-MM)}

2020-11

Current date with the custom output format

#{generateDate(P, MM/dd/yyyy)}

11/23/2020

Current date with a custom format

#{generateDate(P1D, yy-MM-dd)}

20-11-24

Current date +1 day with the custom output format

#{generateDate(P, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ssZ)}

2020-11-23T00:10:01+0300

Current date with the custom output format including time zone offset

formatDate

Formats the input date to another format. Additionally, time zone can be changed in the output result.

#{formatDate($inputDate, $outputFormat, $outputTimeZone)}

  • $inputDate - the date to be formatted, it should be presented in the ISO-8601 format

  • $outputFormat - the outut format based on the date/time format

  • $outputTimeZone - the time zone for the output result

Table 2. Examples of the expressions formatting dates
Expression Result

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSS)}

2017-01-13T09:00:42.862

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862-05:00, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSS)}

2017-01-13T09:00:42.862

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862-0500, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSS)}

Throw exception

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss)}

2017-01-13T09:00:42

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss)}

2017-01-13T09:00:42+0000

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ssZ)}

2017-01-13T09:00:42-05:00

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd)}

2017-01-13

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ, -05:00)}

2017-01-13T04:00:42.862-0500

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T04:00:42.862-05:00, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ, GMT)}

2017-01-13T09:00:42.862+0000

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ, America/New_York)}

2017-01-13T04:00:42.862-0500

#{formatDate(2017:01:13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSS)}

Error: invalid input data

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, BBByyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSS)}

Error: invalid output format

#{formatDate(2017-01-13T09:00:42.862Z, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSS, ABCD)}

Error: invalid output timezone

formatDateTo

Formats the input date to the desired format. The format of the input date should be provided in the second parameter.

#{formatDateTo($inputDate, $inputFormat, $outputFormat)}

  • $inputDate - the date to be formatted, it can be in any format but this format should be described in the second parameter

  • $inputFormat - the input date format based on the date/time format

  • $outputFormat - the output date format based on the date/time format

Since parameters of the expression comma-separated, meaningful commas (like, parts of the date format pattern) should be escaped using \.
Table 3. Examples of the expressions formatting dates with the custom input format
Expression Result

#{formatDateTo("2017-03-31T07:20:43.808Z", "yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSVV", EEE\, dd MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss ZZZZ)}

Fri, 31 Mar 2017 07:20:43 GMT

#{formatDateTo(Fri\, 31 Mar 2017 07:20:43 GMT, EEE\, dd MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss zzz, yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss)}

2017-03-31T07:20:43

shiftDate

Shifts the given input date for a given period in any direction (+/-).

#{shiftDate($inputDate, $inputFormat, $period)}

  • $inputDate - the date to be shifted, it can be in any format but this format should be described in the second parameter

  • $inputFormat - the input date format based on the date/time format

  • $period - the period by which the date will be shifted, it should be written in ISO-8601

Since parameters of the expression comma-separated, meaningful commas (like, parts of the date format pattern) should be escaped using \.
Table 4. Examples of the expressions shifting dates
Expression Result

#{shiftDate(2019-03-19 03:40:00, yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss, -P1Y)}

2018-03-19 01:40:00

#{shiftDate(Wed\, 10 Apr 2019 07:20:43 GMT, EEE\, dd MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss zzz, P1MT2H)}

Fri, 10 May 2019 09:20:43 GMT

#{shiftDate("Wed\, 10 Apr\, 2019\, 07:20:43 GMT", "EEE\, dd MMM\, yyyy\, HH:mm:ss zzz", P1MT2H)}

"Fri, 10 May, 2019, 09:20:43 GMT"

diffDate

Calculates the difference between two dates with given formats and returns result as ISO-8601 period.

#{diffDate($inputDate1, $inputDate1Format, $inputDate2, $inputDate2Format)}

  • $inputDate1 - the first input date, it can be in any format but this format should be described in the second parameter

  • $inputDate1Format - the first input date format based on the date/time format

  • $inputDate2 - the second input date, it can be in any format but this format should be described in the second parameter

  • $inputDate2Format - the second input date format based on the date/time format

Since parameters of the expression comma-separated, meaningful commas (like, parts of the date format pattern) should be escaped using \.
Table 5. Examples of the expressions calculating dates difference
Expression Result

#{diffDate(2019-03-19 03:40:00, yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss, 2019-03-19 03:40, yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm)}

PT0S

#{diffDate("Wed 10 Apr\, 2019\, 13:20:43 GMT", "EEE dd MMM\, yyyy\, HH:mm:ss zzz", "Wed 10 Apr\, 2019\, 09:20:43 America/New_York", "EEE dd MMM\, yyyy\, HH:mm:ss zzz")}

PT0S

#{diffDate(2019-03-19 03:40:00, yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss, 3020-03-19 03:39:20, yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss)}

PT8774591H59M20S

toEpochSecond

Converts the input date to the unix epoch time (the number of seconds from the epoch of 1970-01-01T00:00:00Z).

#{toEpochSecond($inputDate)}

  • $inputDate - the date to be formatted, it should be presented in the ISO-8601 format

Table 6. Examples of the expressions converting the input date to the unix epoch time
Expression Result

#{toEpochSecond(1993-04-16T00:00:00)}

734918400

#{toEpochSecond(2020-12-11T18:43:05+05:30)}

1607692385

Steps

Compare date and current instant

Validates the difference between the current instant and the provided date in seconds.

Then the date '$date' is $comparisonRule current for $seconds seconds

  • $date - The date in the ISO-8601 format.

  • $comparisonRule - The comparison rule.

  • $seconds - The expected number of seconds between the current instant and the provided date.

Example 2. Validate the date is less than current for 10 seconds
Then the date '2020-06-16T15:25:29.516580Z' is less than current for 10 seconds

Compare two dates

Compares two dates according to the given comparison rule.

Then the date '$date1' is $comparisonRule the date '$date2'
Example 3. Compare dates
Then the date '2021-04-20T01:02:03.004Z' is greater than the date '2021-04-20T01:02:03.003Z'
Then the date '2021-04-19' is less than the date '2021-04-20'

Compare date with custom format and current instant

Validates the difference between the current instant and the provided date in seconds using the custom date format.

Then the date '$date' in the format '$format' is $comparisonRule current for $seconds seconds

  • $date - The date to validate.

  • $format - the date/time format.

  • $comparisonRule - The comparison rule.

  • $seconds - The expected number of seconds between the current instant and the provided date.

Example 4. Validate the date is greater than current for 10 seconds
Then the date '2020-06-25T00:19:58.890007Z' in the format 'uuuu-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.nnnX' is > current for 10 seconds