Get Time Difference

  • Thread starter Thread starter RN1
  • Start date Start date
R

RN1

A Form has 2 TextBoxes where in users enter date & time. Example (in
mm/dd/yyyy format):

09/20/2008 17:54 (1st TextBox)

09/29/2008 6:13 (2nd TextBox)

How do I find out how much time (in hours & minutes) has elapsed
between the 2 datetime values? I need the exact time difference.

Thanks.
 
RN1 said:
A Form has 2 TextBoxes where in users enter date & time. Example (in
mm/dd/yyyy format):

09/20/2008 17:54 (1st TextBox)

09/29/2008 6:13 (2nd TextBox)

How do I find out how much time (in hours & minutes) has elapsed
between the 2 datetime values? I need the exact time difference.

Thanks.
Click to expand...

Use the DateTime.Parse or DateTime.ParseExact method to parse the
strings into DateTime values, then you just subtract one from the other
to get a TimeSpan value. With the TimeSpan value you can use the Hours
and Minutes properties to get the hours and minutes.
 
At its simplest, you can do this:

DateTime time1 = DateTime.Parse(TextBox1.Text);
DateTime time2 = DateTime.Parse(TextBox2.Text);

TimeSpan ts = time2 - time1;

int hours = ts.Hours + (ts.Days * 24);
int minutes = ts.Minutes;

This makes a lot of assumptions, however. Assumptions:

1. Textboxes have actual time values
2. Time2 is larger than Time1

If you can verify the assumptions will always be correct, you can roll with
this. If not, you need a safety net. It looks more like this:

DateTime time1, time2;
TimeSpan ts;

bool time1Okay = DateTime.TryParse(TextBox1.Text, out time1);
bool time2Okay = DateTime.TryParse(TextBox2.Text, out time2);

if ((time1Okay) && (time2Okay))
{
int compare = DateTime.Compare(time1, time2);

if (compare < 0)
{
//time 1 is smaller than time 2
ts = time2 - time1;
}
else
{
//time 1 is bigger than time 2
ts = time1 - time2;
}

//Calculate values
int hours = ts.Hours + (ts.Days * 24);
int minutes = ts.Minutes;

//Display Differences here
}
else
{
//Alert user time value(s) is/are bad
}

If you also want seconds, you can do this:

//Calculate values
int hours = ts.Hours + (ts.Days * 24);
int minutes = ts.Minutes;
int seconds = ts.Seconds;

But perhaps you like to go about this the hard way?

double totalSeconds = ts.TotalSeconds;
double workingMinutes = (totalSeconds / 60);
int seconds = (int)(workingMinutes - (int)workingMinutes);
int hours = (int)(workingMinutes / 60);
int minutes = (int)(workingMinutes - (hours *60));

You can also go from the other direction, but you will end up with rounding
errors:

double totalHours = ts.TotalHours;
int hours = (int)totalHours;
double workingMinutes = (totalHours - hours) * 60;
int minutes = (int)workingMinutes;
int seconds = (int)((workingMinutes - minutes) * 60);

Have fun!

--
Gregory A. Beamer
MVP, MCP: +I, SE, SD, DBA

Subscribe to my blog
http://feeds.feedburner.com/GregoryBeamer#

or just read it:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/GregoryBeamer

********************************************
| Think outside the box! |
********************************************
 
Back
Top