DateTime string parsing

.net, c#, c#-2.0

Solution

Theoretically elegant way of doing this: change the `TwoDigitYearMax` property of the `Calendar` used by the `DateTimeFormatInfo` you're using to parse the text. For instance:

CultureInfo current = CultureInfo.CurrentCulture;
DateTimeFormatInfo dtfi = (DateTimeFormatInfo) current.DateTimeFormat.Clone();
// I'm not *sure* whether this is necessary
dtfi.Calendar = (Calendar) dtfi.Calendar.Clone();
dtfi.Calendar.TwoDigitYearMax = 1910;

Then use `dtfi` in your call to `DateTime.ParseExact`.

Practical way of doing this: add "20" to the start of your input, and parse with "yyyyMMdd".

Problem

I have made a generic parser for parsing ascii files. When I want to parse dates, I use ParseExact function in DateTime object to parse, but I get problems with the year. The text to parse is i.e. "090812" with the parseExact string "yyMMdd". I'm hoping to get a DateTime object saying "12/8-2009", but I get "12/8-1909". I know, that I could make an ugly solution by parsing it afterwards, and thereby modifying the year.. Anyone know of a smart way to solve this ?? Thanks in advance.. Søren

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