Java: how do I check if a Date is within a certain range?

Question

I have a series of ranges with start dates and end dates. I want to check to see if a date is within that range.

Date.before() and Date.after() seem to be a little awkward to use. What I really need is something like this pseudocode:

boolean isWithinRange(Date testDate) {
    return testDate >= startDate && testDate <= endDate;
}

Not sure if it's relevant, but the dates I'm pulling from the database have timestamps.

Answer 1

boolean isWithinRange(Date testDate) {
   return !(testDate.before(startDate) || testDate.after(endDate));
}

Doesn't seem that awkward to me. Note that I wrote it that way instead of

return testDate.after(startDate) && testDate.before(endDate);

so it would work even if testDate was exactly equal to one of the end cases.

Answer 2

An easy way is to convert the dates into milliseconds after January 1, 1970 (use Date.getTime()) and then compare these values.

Answer 3

That's the correct way. Calendars work the same way. The best I could offer you (based on your example) is this:

boolean isWithinRange(Date testDate) {
    return testDate.getTime() >= startDate.getTime() &&
             testDate.getTime() <= endDate.getTime();
}

Date.getTime() returns the number of milliseconds since 1/1/1970 00:00:00 GMT, and is a long so it's easily comparable.

Answer 4

Consider using Joda Time. I love this library and wish it would replace the current horrible mess that are the existing Java Date and Calendar classes. It's date handling done right.