Question

I would like to create an NSDate from a string:

NSString *mostRecentMentionMessageTimestamp = [mostRecentMessage valueForKey:@"updated_at"];
NSLog(@"%@",mostRecentMentionMessageTimestamp);
NSDateFormatter *dateFormatter = [[NSDateFormatter alloc]init]; 
[dateFormatter setDateFormat:@"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ssZ"];
NSDate *mostRecentMentionDate = [dateFormatter dateFromString:mostRecentMentionMessageTimestamp];
NSLog(@"%@",mostRecentMentionDate);

When I print my string it is:
2011-11-10T07:22:59Z

After I make a date from string and print it, it is (null)

What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

The format is almost correct, use:

[dateFormatter setDateFormat:@"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss'Z'"];

to solve the time zone issue use the solution by @Jef add:

[dateFormatter setTimeZone: [NSTimeZone timeZoneWithAbbreviation: @"UTC"]];

Full example code:

NSString *mostRecentMentionMessageTimestamp = @"2011-11-10T07:22:59Z";
NSLog(@"input:  %@",mostRecentMentionMessageTimestamp);
NSDateFormatter *dateFormatter = [[NSDateFormatter alloc]init]; 
[dateFormatter setTimeZone: [NSTimeZone timeZoneWithAbbreviation: @"UTC"]];
[dateFormatter setDateFormat:@"yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss'Z'"];
NSDate *mostRecentMentionDate = [dateFormatter dateFromString:mostRecentMentionMessageTimestamp];
NSLog(@"output: %@",mostRecentMentionDate);

NSLog output:

input:  2011-11-10T07:22:59Z
output: 2011-11-10 07:22:59 +0000