Convert decimal to string without commas or dots

Question

In .NET, I need to convert a decimal amount (money) to a numbers-only string, i.e: 123,456.78 -> 12345678

I thought

var dotPos = amount.ToString().LastIndexOf('.');
var amountString = amount.ToString().Remove(dotPos);

would solve my problem, or at least part of it, but it didn't work as I expected. I'm trying to do this possibly without writing a lot of code and using something already designed for a similar purpose.

Asphodel

yourNumber.ToString().Replace(',','').Replace('.', '') – Teresa

"but it didn't work as I expected" - then you didn't read the manual: "Returns a new string in which all the characters in the current instance, beginning at a specified position and continuing through the last position, have been deleted.". So "123,456.78".Remove(7) will yield 123,456. – Poussette

That's what I found out as well. The hard way :) – Asphodel

Answer 1

You could do it like this:

var amountString = string.Join("", amount.Where(char.IsDigit));

Using the char.IsDigit method will protect you from other unknown symbols like $ and will also work with other currency formats. The bottom line, you don't know exactly what that string will always look like so it's safer this way.

Addam

Whitespaces too (depending on the localization) – Gusset

Cheers, it worked. Though Resharper suggested it writen like this: var amountString = string.Join("", amount.Where(char.IsDigit)); – Asphodel

+1 You could make it shorter ...amount.ToString().Where(Char.IsDigit) which is also more efficient. – Amalgam

You could also do var amountString = string.Concat(amount.ToString().Where(char.IsDigit)); – Exponible

Answer 2

You say it's an amount, so I expect 2 digits after the decimal. What about:

 var amountstring = (amount * 100).ToString();

to get the cents-value without delimiters?

Or maybe even

var amountString = ((int)(amount * 100)).ToString();

to make sure no decimals remain.

EDIT
If a cast to int isn't quite what you want (It would just ignore any extra decimals, like Math.Floor), you can also use one of the Math.Round overloads, for instance:

var amountString = Math.Round(amount * 100, MidpointRounding.ToEven).ToString();

The MidpointRounding.ToEven (also known as "Banker's Rounding") will round a .5 value to the nearest even value, instead of always to the next higher value.

Festoonery

Valid for Money and Double types, not Decimal type – Menstruate

It could works with decimal if you use Math.Round(value, 2). Example: long valueInCents = ((long)(Math.Round(value, 2) * 100)); – Nikko

Answer 3

You don't need casts, you don't need to know where the decimal is, and you certainly don't need Linq. This is literally a textbook-case of Regular Expressions:

Regex regx = new Regex("[^0-9]");
var amountString = regx.Replace(amount, "");

Couldn't be simpler. And you can pass it strings with other odd monetary characters, or any character at all, and all you will get out is the decimal string.

Biographer

I don't think there's an overload of Regex.Replace that takes a decimal as input argument. So, you'll be casting amount to a string before running the regex on it. – Fortress

Answer 4

var amountString = amount.ToString().Replace(".","").Replace(",","");

Hypoderm

Answer 5

I think this is what you're looking for:

value.ToString("D")

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dwhawy9k.aspx

Sullins

This throws FormatException seems Invalid for floating point types – Wholehearted

Answer 6

var amount = 123456.78;
var amountString = amount.ToString().Replace(",", "").Replace(".","");

Ingraft

Answer 7

I would say this may help you: var res = amount.ToString().Replace(".", "").Replace(",", ""); :)

Devilmaycare

Answer 8

var amountString = amount.ToString().Replace(",",string.Empty).Replace(".",string.Empty);

This will replace all the "," commas and "." decimal from the amount.

Makalu