alibaba/spring-cloud-alibaba · error · IOException

Invalid date format

Error message

Invalid date format

What it means

Thrown by CustomDateDeserializer.deserialize, a Jackson JsonDeserializer<Date>. It reads a JSON node's text value and parses it with a fixed SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss"). Any value that does not match that exact pattern causes a ParseException, which is caught and rethrown as IOException("Invalid date format"). The deserializer is intended for Nacos config payloads that carry timestamps in that strict format.

Source

Thrown at spring-cloud-alibaba-starters/spring-alibaba-nacos-config/src/main/java/com/alibaba/cloud/nacos/annotation/CustomDateDeserializer.java:44

import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.JsonNode;

public class CustomDateDeserializer extends JsonDeserializer<Date> {

	private final SimpleDateFormat dateFormat = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss");

	public CustomDateDeserializer() {
		super();
	}

	@Override
	public Date deserialize(JsonParser jsonParser, DeserializationContext deserializationContext) throws IOException {
		JsonNode node = jsonParser.getCodec().readTree(jsonParser);
		String date = node.textValue();
		try {
			return dateFormat.parse(date);
		}
		catch (Exception e) {
			throw new IOException("Invalid date format");
		}
	}
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 115d590110)

Solutions

1. Format the value in Nacos as exactly 'yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss' (e.g., '2025-08-13 14:30:00').
2. If a different format is required, register a CustomDateDeserializer variant with the matching pattern, or use @JsonFormat(shape=STRING, pattern=...) on the field.
3. Strip timezone offsets / 'T' separators before publishing the config.

Example fix

// before (config value)
"createTime": "2025-08-13T14:30:00Z"
// after
"createTime": "2025-08-13 14:30:00"

// Validate the date string against the exact pattern before publishing/binding.
private static final SimpleDateFormat FMT = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss");
FMT.setLenient(false);
try { FMT.parse(value); } catch (ParseException e) { /* reject */ }

static boolean isValidNacosDate(String s) {
    if (s == null) return false;
    java.text.SimpleDateFormat f = new java.text.SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss");
    f.setLenient(false);
    try { f.parse(s); return true; } catch (java.text.ParseException e) { return false; }
}

try {
    mapper.readValue(json, MyType.class);
} catch (IOException e) {
    if ("Invalid date format".equals(e.getMessage())) {
        // reformat the offending config value to yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss and retry
    }
}

When it happens

Trigger: A JSON config value bound through a Date field with this deserializer contains a date in a different format (ISO-8601 'yyyy-MM-dd', epoch millis, 'yyyy/MM/dd', 'yyyy-MM-ddTHH:mm:ss', etc.) or a non-date string. Jackson attempts to deserialize the field, parse fails, IOException bubbles up.

Common situations: Config authored as an ISO instant or date-only; upstream system emitting RFC-1123 or epoch numbers; copy-pasting a date in a localized format into Nacos config; version change where a field switched to this deserializer but the published config was not reformatted.

Related errors

• ConfigService is not initialized
• NacosConfigKeysChangeListener must be marked as a single par
• @NacosConfigListener must be over a method with a single p
• ApplicationContext not set
• 4000

AI-assisted analysis of alibaba/spring-cloud-alibaba@115d590110 (2026-08-14). Data as JSON: /api/errors/73452561af851e31. Report an issue: GitHub.