Parse string to TimeSpan

Question

I have some strings of xxh:yym format where xx is hours and yy is minutes like "05h:30m". What is an elegant way to convert a string of this type to TimeSpan?

Meshach

Answer 1

This seems to work, though it is a bit hackish:

TimeSpan span;


if (TimeSpan.TryParse("05h:30m".Replace("m","").Replace("h",""), out span))
            MessageBox.Show(span.ToString());

Leslee

I would suggest using perhaps TimeSpan.TryParse("hh'h:'mm'm'", out span) for a cleaner and more robust solution – Partite

Except when the string is 25h:30m – Caracalla

@fubo any solution not limited ? – Sot

If you need to validate that the input string is a valid time-of-day (>= 00:00 and < 24:00), then you should consider this instead: DateTime.TryParseExact("07:35", "HH:mm" view #24369559 – Sot

Answer 2

DateTime.ParseExact or DateTime.TryParseExact lets you specify the exact format of the input. After you get the DateTime, you can grab the DateTime.TimeOfDay which is a TimeSpan.

In the absence of TimeSpan.TryParseExact, I think an 'elegant' solution is out of the mix.

@buyutec As you suspected, this method would not work if the time spans have more than 24 hours.

Teller

TimeSpan.TryParseExact was added in .NET 4.0. – Alysiaalyson

Answer 3

Are TimeSpan.Parse and TimeSpan.TryParse not options? If you aren't using an "approved" format, you'll need to do the parsing manually. I'd probably capture your two integer values in a regular expression, and then try to parse them into integers, from there you can create a new TimeSpan with its constructor.

Ratable

Answer 4

Here'e one possibility:

TimeSpan.Parse(s.Remove(2, 1).Remove(5, 1));

And if you want to make it more elegant in your code, use an extension method:

public static TimeSpan ToTimeSpan(this string s)
{
  TimeSpan t = TimeSpan.Parse(s.Remove(2, 1).Remove(5, 1));
  return t;
}

Then you can do

"05h:30m".ToTimeSpan();

Gascon

What's about TimeSpan.TryParse("hh'h:'mm'm'", out span) ? https://mcmap.net/q/275906/-parse-string-to-timespan – Sot

Answer 5

From another thread:

How to convert xs:duration to timespan

Stillness