Modifying the date of the file is possible through Java using the File class of Java i.e File.setLastModified() method
Java File Class
The File class is Java’s representation of a file or directory pathname. The File class contains several methods for working with the pathname, deleting and renaming files, creating new directories, listing the contents of a directory, and determining several common attributes of files and directories.
setLastModified Method
The setLastModified() function is a method that comes predefined in the Java File class. The function sets the last modified time of a file or directory. The function sets the last modified value of the file in milliseconds (long type).
Parameters – A string consisting of the new last-modified time in milliseconds.
Return value – It returns a boolean. (True if the operation succeeds, else false).
If the file doesn’t found in the system default date is printed as of 30/01/1970 as the default file is generated by the system.
Now to change the last modified date of a file, follow the given steps.
- First, use the SimpleDateFormat(“mm/dd/yyyy”) constructor to make a new SimpleDateFormat class instance.
- Then, construct a String object with the “mm/dd/yyyy” format.
- Use the parse(String) method of the SimpleDateFormat class to create a new Date object with the date value of the String we created.
- Finally, use File.setLastModified(Date.getTime()) method to set the new “Last Modified” date of our file.
Java
// Java program to change last // modification time of a File import java.io.File;import java.text.ParseException;import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;import java.util.Date; public class GFG { public static void main(String[] args) { try { // Create an object of the File class // Replace the file path with path of the file // who's "last modified" date you want to change File file = new File("/home/mayur/file.txt"); // Create an object of the SimpleDateFormat // class SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("mm/dd/yyyy"); // Print the current "last modified" date of the // file System.out.println( "Original Last Modified Date : " + sdf.format((long)file.lastModified())); // Create a string containing a new date that // has to be set as "last modified" date String newLastModified = "10/10/2020"; // Convert this new date into milliseconds // format (in long type) Date newDate = sdf.parse(newLastModified); // Set the new date as the "last modified" // date of the our file file.setLastModified(newDate.getTime()); // Print the updated "last modified" date System.out.println( "Latest Last Modified Date : " + sdf.format(file.lastModified())); } catch (ParseException e) { // In case of any errors e.printStackTrace(); } }} |
Output:
