MVC DateTime Suffix HTMLHelper
Recently I have been working on an MVC Project, and tonight I got to the point where I wanted to output a date in a specific format, for example Tuesday 13th April 2010. Sadly DateTime formatting still doesn't allow you to specify output a suffix, you can do Tuesday 13 April 2010 but not what I wanted.
I decided that I could achieve what I wanted by writing a quick HTMLHelper, this would then allow me to specify a datetime format string with a magic / special character which I could then replace for the appropriate suffix.
Writing the helper was very quick and easy, if you want to learn about HTMLHelpers and how to write your own I recommend looking at Stephen Walther's Post on HTMLHelpers .
The code for my datetimehelper is below:
using System;
using System.Web.Mvc;
namespace mjjames.MVCHelpers
{
public static class DateTimeExtensions
{
public static string DateTimeFormat(this HtmlHelper helper, string dateTimeFormat, DateTime dateTime){
var dateTimeOutput = dateTime.ToString(dateTimeFormat);
if (dateTimeFormat.Contains("~"))
{
dateTimeOutput = dateTimeOutput.Replace("~", GenerateDaySuffix(dateTime.Day));
}
return dateTimeOutput;
}
/// <summary>
/// Generates a Day Suffix from the Day Number
/// </summary>
/// <param name="day">Day Number</param>
/// <returns>Suffix String</returns>
private static string GenerateDaySuffix(int day)
{
var suffix = "";
//find out if the day matches a suffix which isn't th
switch(day)
{
case 1:
case 21:
case 31:
suffix = "st";
break;
case 2:
case 22:
suffix = "nd";
break;
case 3:
case 23:
suffix = "rd";
break;
default:
suffix = "th";
break;
}
return suffix;
}
}
}
Then to use it first include the namespace in your view:
<%@ Import Namespace="mjjames.MVCHelpers" %>
And then to use it call Html.DateTimeFormat passing the format string and the DateTime value. To use the day suffix include the ~ character. Note you can use it with.
<%= Html.DateTimeFormat("dddd d~ h", Model.StartDate) %>
<%= Html.DateTimeFormat("dddd d h", Model.EndDate) %>
There we go, nice and easy, if you want to use this feel free I hope it helps
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