Sort a dateTime list in C#

Question

I want to sort a list of strings which are formatted to be parsed to dateTime

for example :

19-06-2014
18-06-2014
17-06-2014

// all are strings

with this block of code :

var orderedList = newlist.OrderByDescending( x => DateTime.Parse(x)).ToList();

this gives me the following exception : String was not recognized as a valid DateTime.

As far as i know XX-XX-XXX is correct if you want to parse it to dateTime ?

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/w2sa9yss%28v=vs.110%29.aspx — Sam I am says Reinstate Monica, Oct 14 '14 at 17:39

Dai · Accepted Answer · 2014-10-14T17:44:42.857

4

Use DateTime.ParseExact or TryParseExact as dd-MM-yyyy is not a standard date format in most Cultures (where it's usually dd/MM/yyyy or MM/dd/yyyy).

IEnumerable<DateTime> dtes =
    datesAsString.Select(
        str => DateTime.ParseExact( str, "dd-MM-yyyy", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture )
    ).
    OrderByDescending( dt = > dt );

edited Oct 14 '14 at 17:44

answered Oct 14 '14 at 17:40

Dai

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Or `yyyy-MM-dd` for a machine-readable standard format... – Jon Skeet Oct 14 '14 at 17:41
1

@JonSkeet the OP didn't say he was responsible for the format of his strings, otherwise I'd have set to dump an int64 of unix time ;) – Dai Oct 14 '14 at 17:43
@Dai I think Jon's point is that `yyyy-mm-dd` is still human-readable and unambiguous because no cultures use a `yyyy-dd-mm` format. – D Stanley Oct 14 '14 at 17:48

Sort a dateTime list in C#

1 Answers1