Date objects and prepared statements

Question

Hi, I am trying to parse a String into a Date object with format "dd/MM/yyyy hh/mm/ss". Anyway, i have a method in a separate class which reads in a String and converts it to a formatted Date object.
static public Date convertToDate(String t) throws ParseException {
Date dd = new Date();
ParsePosition p = new ParsePosition(0);
SimpleDateFormat formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("dd/MM/yyyy hh:mm:ss");
//y, M, etc are retrieved as substrings of String t. I know these methods are deprecated as well
dd.setYear(y);
dd.setMonth(M);
dd.setDate(d);
dd.setHours(h);
dd.setMinutes(m);
dd.setSeconds(s);
String formattedDate = formatter.format(dd);
Date theDate = formatter.parse(formattedDate);
return theDate;
Anyway, I am trying to use this in an SQL statement because I am using an Access DB which has a field of Date/Time value. Is this correct to use a Date object then? I have a prepared statement -
PreparedStatement query = connection.prepareStatement(
"SELECT FText FROM wnioutput WHERE Id = ? AND Section = ? AND Start = " +
"? AND Field = ?");
//start is the Date object returned from the previous method in a separate class
query.setInt(1, id);
query.setInt(2, section);
query.setDate(3, formattedStart); - with this part, i get a setDate method not found, or something
query.setString(4, ch);
Can anybody tell me what the problem is? I know there are Date objects of java.util and java.sql. Should i be using an sql Date object? And if so, how, and where do I do this? Thank you!

Answer 1

ok, i just tried
query.setTimestamp(3, new java.sql.Timestamp(formattedStart.getTime()));
where formattedStart is a java.util.Date object
and I get the following error message -
Error occured in getting endDateAndTime: java.sql.SQLException: Exception in databaseDisplay: the error message is:java.sql.SQLException: [Microsoft][ODBC Microsoft Access Driver] Data type mismatch in criteria expression.
java.lang.NullPointerException
where endDateAndTime is
// takes in the startDateAndTime as a formatted String (before it is converted into a Date object)
public String getEndTime(int s, int ID, String stDateAndTime) {
String end = null;
gui g = new gui();
try {
String sql = "SELECT End FROM wnioutput WHERE Id = " + ID +
" AND Section = " + s +
" AND Start = '" + stDateAndTime + "' AND Field = 'Wind50m'";
ResultSet result = g.queryDatabase(sql);
if (result.next())
end = result.getString("End");
} catch (SQLException sqlex) {
System.out.println("Error occured in getting endDateAndTime: " + sqlex.toString());
return end;
Although this method worked fine before. So the error is in setting the date object in the prepared statement. Anymore suggestions??