How to convert a locale string (currency) back into a number?

Question

I'm using toLocaleString() https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number/toLocaleString to convert into a dollar string format, but I'm having trouble reversing the operation. In my case converting back into cents.

dollarString.split('$')[1] * 100 Messes up as soon as the string has a , in it.

Is there a better way to handle this, than to go through strings removing commas?

What if I end up using other currencies. Can't I convert in and out of whatever the currency is into a cents representation so I can do math, and then back into some locale?

Answer 1

Assuming you are in a locale that uses a period as the decimal point, you could use something like this:

var dollarsAsFloat = parseFloat(dollarString.replace(/[^0-9-.]/g, '')); 

The above uses a regular expression to remove everything but digits and the decimal. The parsefloat function will do the rest.

Just be careful. Some countries do not use comma and decimal the way you do! It is probably best to keep the monetary amount in a float variable, and only format it when actually printing it.