Find the closest time from a list of times

Question

So, here's the scenario. I have a file with a created time, and I want to choose a time from a list of times that that file's created time is closest or equal too...what would be the best way to accomplish this?

Answer 1

var closestTime = listOfTimes.OrderBy(t => Math.Abs((t - fileCreateTime).Ticks))                              .First(); 

If you don't want the performance overhead of the OrderBy call then you could use something like the MinBy extension method from MoreLINQ instead:

var closestTime = listOfTimes.MinBy(t => Math.Abs((t - fileCreateTime).Ticks)); 

Answer 2

Something like this:

DateTime fileDate, closestDate; ArrayList theDates; long min = long.MaxValue;  foreach (DateTime date in theDates)  if (Math.Abs(date.Ticks - fileDate.Ticks) < min)  {    min = Math.Abs(date.Ticks - fileDate.Ticks);    closestDate = date;  }