Change datetime display format

I have a julian date that I convert to a MATLAB datetime variable using:

tj = 2.456870501842000e+06;
mtime = datetime(tj,'ConvertFrom','juliandate','TimeZone','UTCLeapSeconds')

This creates the datetime variable "mtime" displayed as 2014-08-01T00:02:39.149Z. I want to change the display format of mtime (for plotting purposes) to show only hour:minute,

mtime.Format = 'HH:mm';

But I get this error:

The date format for UTCLeapSeconds datetimes must be 'uuuu-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss.SSS'Z''.

So is it not possible to change the display format of a datetime variable?

Answer 1

[Star Strider]

It is possible. It just takes some coding gymnastics:

tj = 2.456870501842000e+06;
mtime = datetime(tj,'ConvertFrom','juliandate','TimeZone','UTCLeapSeconds', 'Format','uuuu-MM-dd''T''HH:mm:ss.SSS''Z''')
ltime = mtime;
ltime.TimeZone = 'local';
ltime.Format = 'HH:mm'

producing:

ltime = 

  datetime

   18:02

Set ‘TimeZone’ to be whatever you want it to be.

[Orion]

Thanks for the answer. To clarify, I want to keep the time zone as 'UTCLeapSeconds', and only show the 'HH:mm' (00:02) part of the time as a tickmark label. I don't want to show the full time (eg: 2014-08-01T00:02:39.149Z) on the plot because in that format, a single one covers the entire axis while there are several tickmarks.

[Star Strider]

Simple enough. Just change the time zone back to UTC instead of local:

tj = 2.456870501842000e+06;
mtime = datetime(tj,'ConvertFrom','juliandate','TimeZone','UTCLeapSeconds', 'Format','uuuu-MM-dd''T''HH:mm:ss.SSS''Z''')
ltime = mtime;
ltime.TimeZone = 'UTC';
ltime.Format = 'HH:mm'

producing:

ltime = 

  datetime

   00:02

.