question: private int [ ] parseYMD ( String string ) { string = string . trim ( ) ; try { if ( string . charAt ( 4 ) != '-' || string . charAt ( 7 ) != '-' ) { throw new IllegalArgumentException ( "date must be yyyy-MM-dd" ) ; } int [ ] ymd = new int [ 3 ] ; ymd [ 0 ] = Integer . valueOf ( string . substring ( 0 , 4 ) ) ; ymd [ 1 ] = Integer . valueOf ( string . substring ( 5 , 7 ) ) ; ymd [ 2 ] = Integer . valueOf ( string . substring ( 8 , 10 ) ) ; return ymd ; } catch ( NumberFormatException ex ) { throw new IllegalArgumentException ( "date must be yyyy-MM-dd" , ex ) ; } }
target:  Parse yyyy-MM-dd into a 3 element array [yyyy, mm, dd].