Using DateTime to calculate time between two dates

Question

Hi All,

 

I'm fairly new to programming so I hope this question isn't too basic for you all.  I'm writing a program and part of it needs to calculate the time difference in Months, Days, Minutes, Seconds from Now and a date in the future (that the user has previously entered and is stored in a variable).  I was wondering if anyone has any idea on how to go about this?

Basically the user is asked for a certain date in the future (their birthday), which is stored in variable userDate.  The program then gets the dateTime.Now date and calculates this, then displays Months=a, weeks=b, days=c, hours=d (where a,b,c,d are the relevant numbers calculated).

 

i look forward to any ideas people have.

Many thanks

Paul

Answer 1

DateTime d1 = DateTime.Now;
DateTime d2 = new DateTime(2011, 1, 1);
TimeSpan ts = d1 - d2;

You can use TotalMonths, TotalDays, TotalHours and such properties of TimeSpan. See help for TimeSpan for more info.

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Tan Silliksaar milemarx.com

Answer 2

Try this:

DateTime t1 = DateTime.Now;
DateTime t2 = new DateTime(2011, 8, 9); //yesterday
TimeSpan ts = t1.Subtract(t2);
Messagebox.Show(String.Format("Difference between two dates is: {0} days, {1} hours, {2} minutes, {3} seconds.", ts.Days, ts.Hours, ts.Minutes, ts.Seconds));

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Mitja

Answer 3

Assuming a and b are of type DateTime:

 

Messagebox.Show(String.Format("Difference between two dates is: {0} days, {1} hours, {2} minutes, 
{3} seconds."
, (a - b).TotalDays.toString(), (a - b).TotalHours.ToString(), (a - b).TotalMinutes.ToString(), 
(a - b).TotalSeconds.ToString()));


 

 

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My Blogs

Answer 4

TotalMonths is not a property of TimeSpan. It cannot be because it would need a starting point and a duration. TimeSpan is only a duration.

Answer 5

Hi Paul,

I have tried @Mitja's code, which is working fine on my side, what about you?

 

Have a nice day,

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Jackie Sun [MSFT]
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Answer 6

Many thanks Mitja, this code works fine.  You've saved me a lot of headaches and I've learnt a lot from you.

 

Thanks to everyone else for your kind replies also.

 

Paul