Using a clock in/out timer and displaying the time elapsed - c#

I have an application that is supposed to simulate an employee clocking in and out of work. Clicking clock in will start a timer, and when clock out is clicked, it will end the timer and display how much time is elapsed in the result boxes below. This is probably a really simple task for most people, but I don't have a lot of knowledge or experience with using dates, times, timers, etc., so I don't know what to code for this.

I would recommend you check out the stopwatch class for C#. As you can see in the example below, the format comes out as Hours, Minutes, Seconds, Milliseconds, you could then parse that outputted string to display appropriately inside your timeclock visual. I hope that helps!
Here is a link to the relevant documentation
using System;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Threading;
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Stopwatch stopWatch = new Stopwatch();
stopWatch.Start();
Thread.Sleep(10000);
stopWatch.Stop();
// Get the elapsed time as a TimeSpan value.
TimeSpan ts = stopWatch.Elapsed;
// Format and display the TimeSpan value.
string elapsedTime = String.Format("{0:00}:{1:00}:{2:00}.{3:00}",
ts.Hours, ts.Minutes, ts.Seconds,
ts.Milliseconds / 10);
Console.WriteLine("RunTime " + elapsedTime);
}
}

For the purpose of a time clock I would use the DateTime. This way you'll have the date and time of your clock punches. Simply call DateTime.Now for in/out and read the TimeSpan parameters as needed.
DateTime clockIn = new DateTime(2020, 02, 12, 8, 0, 0);
DateTime clockOut = new DateTime(2020, 02, 12, 16, 30, 0);
TimeSpan timeWorked = clockOut - clockIn;
// Time worked = 8 hours, 30 minutes
string timeWorkedReport = $"Time worked = {timeWorked.Hours} hours, {timeWorked.Minutes} minutes";

Related

Problem with time intervals with given start time and end time c#

I am trying to develop a simple app for my upskill for c#, however I am stuck and new to the functionality of time with c#,
what I need:
I have a 3 text boxes that will contain start time, end time and time interval.
say user entered 7:00 AM , 12:00 PM , and 60 minutes it will store it inside a datatable and add it inside a listbox.
7:00 AM
8:00 AM
9:00 AM
10:00 AM
11:00 AM
12:00 AM
current approach:
I think I need to use the DateTime.AddMinutes(interval) but how am I going to arrive to the logic of it will stop if it reaches the end time? using the DateTime method? I am really confused on what to use, I saw TimeRange, TimeSpan etc.
You can use TimeSpan and DateTime together (to calculate and print respectively)
TimeSpan start = DateTime.Parse("7:00 AM").TimeOfDay;
TimeSpan end = DateTime.Parse("12:00 PM").TimeOfDay;
TimeSpan interval = new TimeSpan(0, 60, 0);
// If Start is bigger than end, Add a day to the end.
if (start > end)
end = end.Add(new TimeSpan(1, 0, 0, 0));
while (true)
{
Console.WriteLine((new DateTime() + start).ToString("hh:mm tt"));
start = start.Add(interval);
if (start > end)
break;
}
Output looks like this,
07:00 AM
08:00 AM
09:00 AM
10:00 AM
11:00 AM
12:00 PM
MS Documentation on TimeSpan
You can use TimeSpan with boolean logical operator to test if the currentTime is less than your endTime.
Below is example code.
TimeSpan startTime;
int interval;
TimeSpan tInterval = new TimeSpan(interval, 0, 0);
TimeSpan endTime;
TimeSpan currentTime = startTime;
while( (currentTime = startTime + tInterval) <= endTime)
{
// add currentTime to list box
}
This should take care of the issue with the End Times being "earlier" than the Start Time:
private static void TestTimeSpan()
{
int minutes = 60;
var interval = new TimeSpan(0,minutes,0);
TimeSpan start = DateTime.Parse("7:00 PM").TimeOfDay;
TimeSpan end = DateTime.Parse("1:00 AM").TimeOfDay;
//End of input data--start of solution
var diffSpan = end - start;
var diffMinutes = diffSpan.TotalMinutes > 0 ? diffSpan.TotalMinutes : diffSpan.TotalMinutes + (60 * 24);
var myTimeList = new List<TimeSpan>();
for(int i = 0; i < diffMinutes + minutes; i += minutes)
{
myTimeList.Add(start);
start = start.Add(interval);
}
myTimeList.ForEach(x => Console.WriteLine((new DateTime() + x).ToString("hh:mm tt")));
}
EDIT
Creating a sequence of Time values based in two input times and an interval is straight forward until the "start time" is earlier than the "end time", because just checking to see if the "end time" is greater than the start time fails your algorithm immediately.
This code utilizes the fact that there are only 24 hours in the day. Since the interval value is given in minutes, we can use that to section those minutes into "steps" of time. This code proceeds to step through each interval in time and capture the time at that step and save that in a List of TimeSpan (the captured value could easily be of type string--formatted as desired).
The trick here is when the "end time" is earlier than the "start time" we get a negative TimeSpan which is then used to calculate the steps to the "end time" on the next day. This is where the (60 * 24) [60 minutes x 24 hrs] part comes in to create the correct "diffMinutes" using a ternary operator.
After that the code simple iterates over the List "myTimeList" to write the formatted TimeSpan to the console. However, this 'List' is just a portable collection that can be sent anywhere in you code to do anything needed.
There are lots of other solutions, this one just seems straightforward, to me.

Formatting TimeSpan to hours, minutes and seconds

i am trying to find a solution for my issue, i am using TimeSpan to get the total amount of time a window was open by subtracting two Datetime objects. it is working but i am getting milliseconds and i only need hours, minutes and seconds to display. this is the code i am working with _timeStart is initialize outside the method but its just gets the time the window opened.
_timeStop = DateTime.Now;
TimeSpan timeSpent = _timeStop.Subtract(_timeStart);
string.Format($"{timeSpent:hh\\:mm\\:ss}");
_logger.Debug(timeSpent);
To display just hours/minutes/seconds use this format string:
var timeSpent = new TimeSpan(1, 12, 23, 62);
Console.WriteLine(timeSpent.ToString(#"hh\:mm\:ss"));
You can find more info here
var str = string.Format("{0:00}:{1:00}:{2:00}", timeSpent.Hours, timeSpent.Minutes, timeSpent.Seconds);
_logger.Debug(str);
should do the trick

C# TimeSpan.Milliseconds formated to 2 digits

I have a timer that I want to show minutes:seconds:hundreds of seconds.
Since C# timespan doesn't have a method to get hundreds but only milliseconds, I need to somehow format this.
TimeSpan ts = stopWatch.Elapsed;
currentTime = String.Format("{0:00}:{1:00}:{2:00}", ts.Minutes, ts.Seconds, Math.Round(Convert.ToDecimal(ts.Milliseconds),2));
ClockTextBlock.Text = currentTime;
I've tried with Math.Round and nothing happened. The result is still anywhere from 1-3 digit, like this:
01:12:7
01:12:77
01:12:777
I want format to always be like
01:12:07
01:12:77
You need:
String.Format(#"Time : {0:mm\:ss\.ff}", ts)
Where "ts" is your TimeSpan object. You can also always extend this to include hours etc. The fff stuff is the number of significant digits of the second fractions
You can use a custom TimeSpan format string for that (here we're only displaying the first two digits of the milliseconds with ff, which represent the hundredths):
ClockTextBlock.Text = ts.ToString("mm\\:ss\\:ff");
You could set a DateTime type timezone and plus with Timespan span.
You would get a datetime and format it!
DateTime timezone = new DateTime(1, 1, 1);
TimeSpan span = stopWatch.Elapsed;
ClockTextBlock.Text=(timezone + span).ToString("mm:ss:ff");
Just put the format in toString and it simply will show you the desired format :)
Stopwatch s2 = new Stopwatch();
s2.Start();
Console.WriteLine(s2.Elapsed.ToString(#"hh\:mm\:ss"));
Since a millisecond is 1/1000 of a second, all you need to do is divide the milliseconds by 10 to get 100's of a second. If you are concerned about rounding, then just do it manually before the division.
int hundredths = (int)Math.Round((double)ts.Milliseconds / 10);
currentTime = String.Format("{0}:{1}:{2}", ts.Minutes.ToString(D2), ts.Seconds.ToString(D2), hundredths.ToString(D2);
ClockTextBlock.Text = currentTime;

How to format user input into time

I am writing a simple class in C# that all it does is print three float variables to a DOS console (hour, minutes, seconds). The output is something like this: Hour = 3, Minutes = 15, Seconds = 0. But I want to know how would I go about in formatting it to show 3:15:00 rather than Hour = 3, Minutes = 15, Seconds = 0
This is the method I created that prints out the info:
/// <summary>
/// Prints the time to the console
/// </summary>
public void PrintTime()
{
Console.WriteLine(pHour.ToString() + ":" + pMinutes.ToString() + ":" + Seconds.ToString());
}
Can someone help me figure out how to format this? I went online and found out about DateTime but it requires the date as well and I don't need to add that for this homework. Many thanks in advance!
You can use the string format that Console.WriteLine provides:
Console.WriteLine("{0}:{1:00}:{2:00}", pHour, pMinutes, Seconds);
A little bit out of context. One more method is to use DateTime class to output the string
DateTime.Now.ToString("yyyy MM dd HH:mm:ss.fff tt", [System.Globalization.CultureInfo]::GetCultureInfo("en-US"));
The advantage of this method is easy insertion of separators in Date. Disadvantage is you cant insert your normal text inside the format string.
You could use a DateTime object to represent your Time and just disregard the Date part. Or you could use a TimeSpan object to accomplish a similar feat.
Or, just disregard both entirely and print out your input values as is:
int hours = 5;
int minutes = 55;
int seconds = 7;
DateTime dt = new DateTime(2014, 1, 1, hours, minutes, seconds);
TimeSpan ts = new TimeSpan(hours, minutes, seconds);
Console.WriteLine("{0:00}:{1:00}:{2:00}", dt.Hour, dt.Minute, dt.Second);
Console.WriteLine("{0:00}:{1:00}:{2:00}", ts.Hours, ts.Minutes, ts.Seconds); // This is actually not needed for using a TimeSpan, see next line.
Console.WriteLine(ts);
Console.WriteLine("{0:00}:{1:00}:{2:00}", hours, minutes, seconds);
In action
https://dotnetfiddle.net/6lUwnR
Note that weird stuff will happen if you pass in out of range values in some cases, so make sure to validate your input! :)

Time Math Guidance needed

I have a DateTime object that is 10:00 AM
This time represents what time of day a report should be run.
I want to calculate the amount of time remaining from NOW until 10:00 AM
part of my confusion is NOW might be after 10:am or BEFORE 10am,
I keep playing around with TimeSpan, but my results are not quite right... I am sure this is simple, but it is one of those things I have been working of for a few hours and I need a push in the right direction...
I want the timespan object timeTillRun to be correct...here is what I have tried:
{
DateTime scheduledRun = DateTime.Today.AddHours(_timeToStart);//_timeToStart = 10
TimeSpan timeTillRun = DateTime.Now - scheduledRun;
}
This will work... but you need to reverse the order of subtraction:
TimeSpan timeTillRun = scheduledRun - DateTime.Now;
Note that if it's currently after 10AM, timeTillRun will be negative. You will presumably also need to check if the current time is on or after 10AM, then add 10 hours and one day to DateTime.Today to obtain the next run time. Alternatively, you could test if timeTillRun is negative; if so, just add one day to it (timeTillRun += new TimeSpan(1, 0, 0, 0)).
Try this
DateTime timeToStart = DateTime.Today.AddHours(10);
TimeSpan timeTillRun;
// Checking to see if current time is passed schedule run, if it is then we add a day (this is assuming this is run daily, if days are skipped like weekends for example then this would need some tweaking)
if (DateTime.Now > timeToStart)
timeTillRun = DateTime.Now.AddDays(1.0) - timeToStart;
else
timeTillRun = DateTime.Today - timeToStart;
double totalHoursRemaining = timeTillRun.TotalHours; // get total hours remaining
string prettyRemaining = String.Format("{0} day and {1} hours", timeTillRun.Days, timeTillRun.Hours); // can do some outputting here

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