C# Can't get String to DateTime conversion to work

Question

Hi,

I've done some simple string -> DateTime conversions before using DateTime.ParseExact(), but I have a string that I can't seem to get parsed properly. I'm probably doing something very obvious wrong but I just can't see what it is.

The code is as follows:

string date = "Tue Jun 23, 2009 2:23 pm";
DateTime lastupdate = DateTime.ParseExact(date, "ddd MMM dd, yyyy h:mm tt", null);

Running it gives a FormatException. Is my formatting string incorrect?

ps I've tried to use p.m. rather than pm in the input string but that didn't help either.

Answer 1

Do you need to parse it exactly, or can you not just use DateTime.Parse?

Answer 2

Try this:

DateTime lastupdate = DateTime.ParseExact(date, "ddd MMM dd, yyyy h:mm tt", new System.Globalization.CultureInfo("en-us"));

An error would occur if the culture was for example "fr-fr" or "de-de".