Date columns in SQL-Server (MSSQL-JDBC 3.0) running under Java 1.7.0 retrieved as 2 days in the past

Thank you for your feedback. The Microsoft JDBC Driver for SQL Server does not yet support JRE 1.7.

We are aware of the getDate issue between our JDBC driver & JRE 1.7 and we are looking into publishing a hotfix to enable customers to move forward with non-production testing of our driver with JRE 1.7.

We will publish a link to the hotfix on our blog once available. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jdbcteam/

The hotfix is now available. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jdbcteam/archive/2012/01/20/hotfix-available-for-date-issue-when-using-jre-1-7.aspx

Our blog also contains information on the known issues with JRE 1.6u29 & 1.6u30.

Shamitha Reddy Program Manager - Microsoft JDBC Driver for SQL Server

I don't quite have an answer for you. But, I've recreated your situation as you described. It is the same with the jdbc driver v3.101 and v3.202 and v4.ctp3 when run under jdk1.7. However, the v2 driver from MS gives your expected answer both under jdk1.6 and jdk1.7. If you need a quick fix and can move to an older jdbc driver, that may work for you.

Other thoughts are on how the MS jdbc driver handles dates and conversion of Date objects between SQL Server and the jvm. Since the storage of the date is without a time zone, the interpretation of the Date object by the driver is based on the default time zone for the machine running the jdbc driver. For instance, if you store a smalldate of '2011-10-11 12:00' and retrieve it from a machine with the default time zone set to GMT-7 then the resulting UTC time of the Date object would be '2011-10-11 19:00'. It could be that there is some change in jdk1.7 that impacts this conversion process in the driver resulting in a wild offset. You might experiment with the ResultSet.getDate(column, Calendar) method to see if a Calendar with a specific time zone gets you the result you want or helps make sense of why you are seeing the strange offset in the conversion.

I don't have a SQL Server setup, but I can't reproduce your problem with PostgreSQL 9.0 and MySQL 5.1 on Windows 7 x64 with JDK 1.7.0. So JDK 1.7.0 can be excluded from being suspect. I have the impression that the SQL Server JDBC driver is to blame here. I'd suggest to use the jTDS JDBC driver instead. It has always been praised for its better performance and stability as opposed to the MS-provided SQL Server JDBC driver.