Java file time tutorial
last modified July 6, 2020
In Java file time tutorial, we show how to determine file creation, last modification,
and last access time in Java with Files
and BasicFileAttributes
.
Files
Files
is a Java class that contains static methods that operate on files,
directories, or other types of files. Mostly, these methods will delegate to the
associated file system provider to perform the file operations.
BasicFileAttributes
BasicFileAttributes
holds basic file attributes. These are attributes
that are common to many file systems and consist of mandatory and optional file attributes,
such as size of file creation time. BasicFileAttributes
are retrieved with
Files.readAttributes()
method.
Java file creation time
The file creation time in Java is retrieved with BasicFileAttributes.creationTime()
method.
package com.zetcode; import java.io.File; import java.io.IOException; import java.nio.file.Files; import java.nio.file.Path; import java.nio.file.attribute.BasicFileAttributes; public class JavaFileLastCreationTime { public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException { String fileName = "/home/janbodnar/world.sql"; File myfile = new File(fileName); Path path = myfile.toPath(); BasicFileAttributes fatr = Files.readAttributes(path, BasicFileAttributes.class); System.out.printf("File creation time: %s%n", fatr.creationTime()); } }
This example prints the creation time of the specified file.
File creation time: 2017-06-01T12:48:40Z
This is a sample output.
Java file last modification time
The BasicFileAttributes.lastModifiedTime()
method
gets the last modification time of a file in Java.
package com.zetcode; import java.io.File; import java.io.IOException; import java.nio.file.Files; import java.nio.file.Path; import java.nio.file.attribute.BasicFileAttributes; public class JavaFileLastModifiedTime { public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException { String fileName = "/home/janbodnar/world.sql"; File myfile = new File(fileName); Path path = myfile.toPath(); BasicFileAttributes fatr = Files.readAttributes(path, BasicFileAttributes.class); System.out.printf("Last modification time: %s%n", fatr.lastModifiedTime()); } }
This example prints the last modification time of the specified file.
Last modification time: 2017-06-01T12:48:40Z
This is a sample output.
Java file last access time
The last access time of a file in Java is retrieved with
BasicFileAttributes.lastAccessTime()
method.
package com.zetcode; import java.io.File; import java.io.IOException; import java.nio.file.Files; import java.nio.file.Path; import java.nio.file.attribute.BasicFileAttributes; public class JavaFileLastAccessTime { public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException { String fileName = "/home/janbodnar/world.sql"; File myfile = new File(fileName); Path path = myfile.toPath(); BasicFileAttributes fatr = Files.readAttributes(path, BasicFileAttributes.class); System.out.printf("Last access time: %s%n", fatr.lastAccessTime()); } }
This example prints the last access time of the specified file.
Last access time: 2017-06-01T12:48:40Z
This is a sample output.
In this tutorial, we have determined the file creation, last modification, and last
access time with Files
and BasicFileAttributes
.
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