Date and time formats are specified by date and time pattern strings. Within date and time pattern strings, unquoted letters from 'A' to 'Z' and from 'a' to 'z' are interpreted as pattern letters representing the components of a date or time string. Text can be quoted using single quotes (') to avoid interpretation. "''" represents a single quote. All other characters are not interpreted; they're simply copied into the output string during formatting or matched against the input string during parsing.

The following pattern letters are defined (all other characters from 'A' to 'Z' and from 'a' to 'z' are reserved):

Letter
Date or Time Component
Presentation
Examples
G
Era designator
Text
AD
y
Year
Year
1996; 96
Y
Week year
Year
2009; 09
M
Month in year
Month
July; Jul; 07
w
Week in year
Number
27
W
Week in month
Number
2
D
Day in year
Number
189
d
Day in month
Number
10
F
Day of week in month
Number
2
E
Day name in week
Text
Tuesday; Tue
u
Day number of week (1 = Monday, ..., 7 = Sunday)
Number
1
a
Am/pm marker
Text
PM
H
Hour in day (0-23)
Number
0
k
Hour in day (1-24)
Number
24
K
Hour in am/pm (0-11)
Number
0
h
Hour in am/pm (1-12)
Number
12
m
Minute in hour
Number
30
s
Second in minute
Number
55
S
Millisecond
Number
978
z
Time zone
General time zone
Pacific Standard Time; PST; GMT-08:00
Z
Time zone
RFC 822 time zone
-0800
X
Time zone
ISO 8601 time zone
-08; -0800; -08:00


Examples

Date and Time Pattern
Result
"yyyy.MM.dd G 'at' HH:mm:ss z"
2001.07.04 AD at 12:08:56 PDT
"EEE, MMM d, ''yy"
Wed, Jul 4, '01
"h:mm a"
12:08 PM
"hh 'o''clock' a, zzzz"
12 o'clock PM, Pacific Daylight Time
"K:mm a, z"
0:08 PM, PDT
"yyyyy.MMMMM.dd GGG hh:mm aaa"
02001.July.04 AD 12:08 PM
"EEE, d MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss Z"
Wed, 4 Jul 2001 12:08:56 -0700
"yyMMddHHmmssZ"
010704120856-0700
"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSZ"
2001-07-04T12:08:56.235-0700
"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSSXXX"
2001-07-04T12:08:56.235-07:00
"YYYY-'W'ww-u"
2001-W27-3


This information was retrieved from the following site.