DateTime Format in C#

Question

I experiencing a strange behavior of C#. Its some thing like this..

var date = DateTime.Now.ToString("MM/dd/yyyy");

I expecting out to be

04/24/2009

but in actuall its returning

04-24-2009

and my OS culture is en-GB, I'm using .Net 3.5 and WPF

any solutions please... ???

Answer 1

According to the MSDN docs for custom date and time format strings, / is a placeholder:

Represents the date separator defined in the current DateTimeFormatInfo.DateSeparator property. This separator is used to differentiate years, months, and days.

If you want a definite slash, use "MM'/'dd'/'yyyy":

DateTime.Now.ToString("MM'/'dd'/'yyyy")

Answer 2

It uses the separator set up in the regional settings, since "/" is the substitute character for the separator.

You can create your own DateTimeFormat instance with different separators.

Answer 3

Try calling ToString on the date itself and passing the CultureInfo.InvariantCulture object:

string date = yourDate.ToString("MM/dd/yyyy", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture));