Why is TFormatSettings not behaving as expected?

delphi, str-to-date

Solution

StrToDate() needs the separator which is defined in FS.DateSeparator: Char; and so can't be empty.

Reference: http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/Libraries/XE3/en/System.SysUtils.StrToDate

Problem

I expect the following code to work: ``` program Project3; {$APPTYPE CONSOLE} {$R *.res} uses System.SysUtils; var FS: TFormatSettings; const DF = 'yyyymmdd'; begin try WriteLn(FormatDateTime(DF, Now)); FS := TFormatSettings.Create; FS.ShortDateFormat := DF; WriteLn(StrToDate('20121219', FS)); ReadLn; except on E: Exception do Writeln(E.ClassName, ': ', E.Message); end; end. ``` Why is it throwing an exception, saying that '20121219' is not a valid date? Isn't that exactly what passing the TFormatSettings is supposed to do?

Original source