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Data types

This table describes how to use the data types supported by Data Shaping Expression Language.

Type Syntax Examples Corresponding Java class
String Strings should be delimited by single or double quotes. If you want to use quotes in your string, you can escape them with \ or use different quotes than the ones used to delimit the string. You can also use the following sequences to escape: \n, \r, \f, \t, \b, \/, \' in case of single quoted string, and \" in case of double quoted string.

CR, NL, and LF are not allowed in a quoted string.

 
'blue'
"yellow"
"John \"Big\" Doe"
"John 'Big' Doe"
 java.lang.string
Integer Integers are whole numbers, positive, or negative. 
1
-42
2147483647
 java.lang.Integer
Long Long values should be followed by l or L to be interpreted as long. Otherwise they are interpreted as integers. 
1l
-42L
9223372036854775807L
 java.lang.Long
Double Double values should written in scientific notation or be followed by d or D to be interpreted as double. Otherwise they are interpreted as decimals. 
1.5d
5D
-.1415d
-4.73E-2
 java.lang.Double
Float Float values can be written in scientific notation. They should be followed by f or F to be interpreted as float. Otherwise they are interpreted as double if they contain scientific notation, or decimal if they do not. 
3.1415f
1.5e-2f
5F
 java.lang.Float
Decimal Decimals are numbers with a decimal point 
0.3
-1.17
 java.math.BigDecimal
Boolean Booleans are case insensitive. 
True
false
FALSE
 java.lang.Boolean
Bytes Bytes should be written with hexadecimal characters in lowercase or uppercase, prefixed by 0x or 0X. 
0xFFFFFF
0X1234567890
0x0a6e
 byte[]
Date Dates should be delimited by single or double quotes. They are composed of a year, month and day in the format yyyyMMdd, yyyy/MM/dd or yyyy-MM-dd. To evaluate them as dates instead of strings, you need to use a toDate function. See Data type functions. 
'2019-08-05'
"1981/09/12"
'20170223'
 java.time.LocalDate
Time Times should be delimited by single or double quotes. They are composed of hours and minutes, and can also contain seconds, milliseconds, and a timezone. The format should be HH:mm, hh:mm:ss or HH:mm:ss.SSS To evaluate them as times instead of strings, you need to use a toTime function. 
"09:44"
'12:32:25'
"09:51:32.568"
"01:02:03.456+03:00"
  • java.time.LocalTime
  • java class java.time.OffsetTime
Datetime Datetimes should be delimited by single or double quotes. They are composed of a date and a time, with an optional timezone. The format should follow the international standard ISO 8601. To evaluate them as datetimes instead of strings, you need to use a toDateTime function. 
"2017-07-02T15:04:05.567-08:00"
'2024-05-07T14:27'
  • java.time.OffsetDateTime
  • java class java.time.LocalDateTime

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