.NET DateTime not returning AM/PM in ToShortTimeString()

Question

I've run into a problem that's driving me crazy. In my application (ASP.NET MVC2 /.NET4), I simply running this:

DateTime.Now.ToShortTimeString()

All the examples I've seen indicate I should get something like: 12:32 PM, however I'm getting 12:32 without the AM/PM.

I launched LinqPad 4 to see if I could replicate this. Instead, it returns 12:32 PM correctly.

What the hell?

Answer 1

You may also try a custom format to avoid culture specific confusions:

DateTime.Now.ToString("hh:mm tt")

Answer 2

KBrimington looks to be correct:

The string returned by the ToShortTimeString method is culture-sensitive. It reflects the pattern defined by the current culture's DateTimeFormatInfo object. For example, for the en-US culture, the standard short time pattern is "h:mm tt"; for the de-DE culture, it is "HH:mm"; for the ja-JP culture, it is "H:mm". The specific format string on a particular computer can also be customized so that it differs from the standard short time format string.

From MSDN

Answer 3

If you don't want to mess with the Culture for your whole thread/application, try this:

CultureInfo ci = new CultureInfo("en-US");
string formatedDate = DateTime.Now.ToString("t", ci);

You can find the list of DateTime Format strings here.