We Keep Coding

Why bigint number not split with c# CultureInfo?

I'm beginner in C#, i have a currency field in SQL server, and that field's data type is bigint
For example I have this number:
12598546
I want to show it in this format:
12,598,546
My C# code for it:
query_statusOfRPTOST[i].price_year.ToString("N0", CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("es-US"))
That code in my local PC works fine, but when application runs in server, number is shown in following format:
12598,546
What's happening? And how can I solve that problem?

If you look into NumberFormat of this CultureInfo you will see next:
var culture = CultureInfo.GetCultureInfo("es-US");
Console.WriteLine(string.Join(",",culture.NumberFormat.NumberGroupSizes));
//output: 3,0
What means, according to msdn that to the left of decimal separator first group will contain 3 digits, and other will not be groupped.
If you want to get required value presented in format with groupping, you should do the one of following:
Create specific culture, based on es-US and set NumberGroupSizes as [3].
Use another existing CultureInfo with predefined NumberGroupSizes with [3] - for example, en-US.
Use special formatting, as Ali suggested
Code example for first:
long a = 12598546;
var culture = CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("es-US");
culture.NumberFormat.NumberGroupSizes = new int[] { 3 };
Console.WriteLine(a.ToString("N0", culture));
// output 12,598,546
Code example for second:
long a = 12598546;
Console.WriteLine(a.ToString("N0", CultureInfo.GetCultureInfo("en-US")));
// output 12,598,546

You can use string.Format like this:
string.Format("{0:#,###0}", query_statusOfRPTOST[i].price_year)

String to Double Conversion (Comma to dot issue)

Struggling with the basics - I'm trying to code a simple currency converter. The XML provided by external source uses comma as a decimal separator for exchange rate (kurs_sredni):
<pozycja>
<nazwa_waluty>bat (Tajlandia)</nazwa_waluty>
<przelicznik>1</przelicznik>
<kod_waluty>THB</kod_waluty>
<kurs_sredni>0,1099</kurs_sredni>
</pozycja>
I already managed to load the data from XML into a nifty list of objects (kursyAktualne), and now i'm trying to do the math. I'm stuck with conversion.
First of all i'm assigning "kurs_sredni" to a string, trying to replace "," with "." and converting the hell out of it:
string kursS = kursyAktualne[iNa].kurs_sredni;
kursS.Replace(",",".");
kurs = Convert.ToDouble(kursS);
MessageBox.Show(kurs.ToString());
The messagebox show 1099 instead of expected 0.1099 and kursS still has comma, not dot.
Tried toying with some cultureInfo stuff i googled, but that was too random. I need to understand how to control this.

Just use decimal.Parse but specify a CultureInfo. There's nothing "random" about it - pick an appropriate CultureInfo, and then use that. For example:
using System;
using System.Globalization;
class Test
{
static void Main()
{
var french = CultureInfo.GetCultureInfo("fr-FR");
decimal value = decimal.Parse("0,1099", french);
Console.WriteLine(value.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture)); // 0.1099
}
}
This is just using French as one example of a culture which uses , as a decimal separator. It would probably make sense to use the culture of the origin of the data.
Note that decimal is a better pick for currency values than double - you're trying to represent an "artificial" construct which is naturally specified in base10, rather than a "natural" continuous value such as a weight.
(I would also be wary of a data provider who provides data in a non-standard format. If they're getting that wrong, who knows what else they'll get wrong. It's not like XML doesn't have a well-specified format for numbers...)

It is because Replace method returns new string with replaced characters. It does not modify your original string.
So you need to reassign it:
kursS = kursS.Replace(",",".");

Replace returns a string. So you need an assignment.
kursS = kursS.Replace(",", ".");
There is "neater" way of doing this by using CulturInfo. Look this up on the MSDN website.

You replace result isn't used, but the original value that doesn't contain the replace.
You should do:
kursS = kursS.Replace(",", ".")
In addition this method isn't really safe if there are thousands-separators.
So if you are not using culture settings you should do:
kursS = kursS.Replace(".", "").Replace(",", ".")

C# Default Format For Comma-Delimited Numbers

I have a C# application that displays some large numbers in a textbox. I want it to use a comma as a thousands separator. I use the following code to do that:
txtNumberDisplay.Text = intNumber.ToString("N0");
The above was working fine until recently it was displaying numbers correctly in the form of:
123,456
Recently the thousands separator has somehow changed to a period "." and the numbers display like this:
123.456
My first thought was the culture had somehow gotten set incorrectly but I checked the default culture for the current thread at the point it displays this number and it is set correctly to "EN-US". Any idea why this would display a period instead of a comma?
Thanks,

use string.Format:
int value = 1234;
string.Format(#"{0:#\,##0}", value);
//Output will be 1,234
EDIT: added an \,
EDIT2: Just found out that this wont work on numbers with 6 digits (two commas would be needed), so here is a workarount, but there must be a better solution...
int value = 1234;
string s = "#";
for (int i = 0; i < value.ToString().Length / 3; i++) s += #"\,###";
string output = string.Format(#"{0:" + s + "}", value);

My first thought was the culture had somehow gotten set incorrectly but I checked the default culture for the current thread at the point it displays this number and it is set correctly to "EN-US". Any idea why this would display a period instead of a comma?
Either the culture is something different than "en-US" or you have customized the number format in the regional settings in the control panel.
When you execute intNumber.ToString("N0") without specifying a culture the culture used is Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture. Perhaps you examined Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture which is based on the language version of Windows and not used for formatting?
If the current culture really is "en-US" you should go to Control Panel -> Clock, Language, and Region -> Change date, time, or number formats and make sure that the Digit grouping symbol is comma and not dot. The symbol shown in the control panel is the symbol used when you do not specify a CultureInfo when you format the number.
You have several options:
Force the culture when formatting, e.g. intNumber.ToString("N0", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture) to get commas as you desire.
Realize that the user should be able to control the formatting. This is what your code currently does.

This should work perfectly fine:
int.ToString("F", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture);

Windows 8.1 (and probably 8 as well) has incorrect culture regional settings stored.
Therefore, if you rely on ToString("formatstring", desired_culture) it won't work.
Since you write
[...] The above was working fine until recently it was displaying numbers
correctly [...]
I suppose in-between the working and not-working, you upgraded to Windows 8 or 8.1, which explains why it suddenly stopped working.
For example for culture German - Switzerland ("de-CH") it incorrectly sets the NumberDecimalSeparator to "," instead of "." (and the thousand-separator to " " instead of "'") and therefore copy-pasting to Excel won't work anymore (Excel seems to somehow use a non-system format).
You best hardcode your number format, because that's the only way to keep it working across windows-versions.
This is how I do it (you might want to change the separators and the currency-symbol):
private static System.Globalization.NumberFormatInfo SetupNumberFormatInfo()
{
//System.Globalization.NumberFormatInfo nfi = (System.Globalization.NumberFormatInfo)System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantCulture.NumberFormat.Clone();
System.Globalization.NumberFormatInfo nfi = new System.Globalization.NumberFormatInfo();
nfi.NumberGroupSeparator = "'";
nfi.NumberDecimalSeparator = ".";
nfi.CurrencyGroupSeparator = "'";
nfi.CurrencyDecimalSeparator = ".";
nfi.CurrencySymbol = "CHF";
return nfi;
} // End Function SetupNumberFormatInfo
private static System.Globalization.NumberFormatInfo m_nfi = SetupNumberFormatInfo();
public static string ToNumberString(this double dblQuantity)
{
return ToNumberString(dblQuantity, "N0");
}
public static string ToNumberString(this double dblQuantity, string Format)
{
// http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.globalization.numberformatinfo%28VS.71%29.aspx
//double dblQuantity = -123456789.123456789;
//string strFormattedInteger = dblQuantity.ToString("N0", m_nfi);
//strFormattedInteger = string.Format(m_nfi, "{0:N0}", dblQuantity);
return dblQuantity.ToString(Format, m_nfi);
}

xml Convert.ToDouble works wrong

I have a project that reads some data from xml file
Convert.ToDouble metod works wrong.
it converts 0.05 as 5.
is there any idea to solve this problem?
this is my ReadDataFromXml method:
public static List<double> XmldenTabanDegerleriniOku(string ID)
{
string ayarDir = System.Environment.CurrentDirectory + "\\Ayarlar";
string Dosya = ayarDir + "\\YuzeyBoyutlari.xml";
XmlDocument doc = new XmlDocument();
doc.Load(Dosya);
XmlNodeList holList = doc.GetElementsByTagName("HOL");
List<double> tabanDegerleri = new List<double>();
foreach (XmlNode node in holList)
{
XmlElement holElement = (XmlElement)node;
if (node.Attributes["ID"].Value == ID) {
double uzunluk =Convert.ToDouble(holElement.GetElementsByTagName("uzunluk")[0].InnerText.Replace('.',','));
double genislik =Convert.ToDouble(holElement.GetElementsByTagName("genislik")[0].InnerText.Replace('.',','));
double cizgilerArasiMesafe = Convert.ToDouble(holElement.GetElementsByTagName("cizgilerArasiMesafe")[0].InnerText.Replace('.', ','));
tabanDegerleri.Add(uzunluk);
tabanDegerleri.Add(genislik);
tabanDegerleri.Add(cizgilerArasiMesafe);
break;
}
}
return tabanDegerleri;
}

Don't use Convert.ToDouble then: use XmlConvert.ToDouble. I believe that effectively uses the invariant culture (as XML documents conveying data shouldn't be culture-specific in that sense).
EDIT: I hadn't noticed that you were manually replacing '.' with ',' - so when you say that "it is converting 0.05 as 5" you really mean "it is converting 0,05 as 5". You should use XmlConvert and stop messing with the data yourself.

The problem
Your are replacing . by , before converting. That means when you get 0.05 you convert it to 0,05. That conversion will behave according to your locale. In US, for instance, that is 5.
The Solution
Take a look at #JonSkeet's answer and use XmlConvert.ToDouble which is culture invariant (it uses XML standarts for data formatting). And, of course, drop the string replacements.

You should use the correct CultureInfo instead of replacing the dots with comas.
You can do this using this signature of the Convert.ToDouble method. Something like:
double uzunluk =Convert.ToDouble(holElement.GetElementsByTagName("uzunluk")[0].InnerText, CultureInfo.CurrentCulture);
If you still have a problem with dots and comas, it means that the culture of your Xml file is not coherent with the current culture (which is the culture of the machine executing the line of code), for example your Windows installation is set to have comas as decimal separators (in this case it seems CurrentCulture is the Turkish culture, and your xml has a different one, like US Culture). In this case, you have to call Convert using the actual culture of your xml, understanding where it has been generated.
If it has dots as decimal separators, then you can try getting the common invariant culture (CultureInfo.InvariantCulture), which indeed uses dots, or maybe be more specific. (see GetCultureInfo).

I notice you're doing some text replacement of . to ,.
Does this mean you are in a culture where there's a decimal comma rather than decimal point? In this case "0.05" is 5. If you wanted the fraction the string would have to be "0,05".

Does the double conversion work if you convert the value before changing the decimal point to a comma? I think you have a locale issue.

Best way to parse float?

What is the best way to parse a float in CSharp?
I know about TryParse, but what I'm particularly wondering about is dots, commas etc.
I'm having problems with my website. On my dev server, the ',' is for decimals, the '.' for separator. On the prod server though, it is the other way round.
How can I best capture this?

I agree with leppie's reply; to put that in terms of code:
string s = "123,456.789";
float f = float.Parse(s, CultureInfo.InvariantCulture);

Depends where the input is coming from.
If your input comes from the user, you should use the CultureInfo the user/page is using (Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture).
You can get and indication of the culture of the user, by looking at the HttpRequest.UserLanguages property. (Not correct 100%, but I've found it a very good first guess) With that information, you can set the Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture at the start of the page.
If your input comes from an internal source, you can use the InvariantCulture to parse the string.
The Parse method is somewhat easier to use, if your input is from a controlled source. That is, you have already validated the string. Parse throws a (slow) exception if its fails.
If the input is uncontrolled, (from the user, or other Internet source) the TryParse looks better to me.

If you want persist values ( numbers, date, time, etc... ) for internal purpose. Everytime use "InvariantCulture" for formating & parsing values. "InvariantCulture" is same on every computer, every OS with any user's culture/language/etc...
string strFloat = (15.789f).ToString(System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantInfo);
float numFloat = float.Parse(System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantInfo, strFloat);
string strNow = DateTime.Now.ToString(System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantInfo);
DateTime now = DateTime.Parse(System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantInfo, strNow);

You could always use the overload of Parse which includes the culture to use?
For instance:
double number = Double.Parse("42,22", new CultureInfo("nl-NL").NumberFormat); // dutch number formatting
If you have control over all your data, you should use "CultureInfo.InvariantCulture" in all of your code.

Use a neutral culture (or one you know) when parsing with Try/Parse.

Pass in a CultureInfo or NumberFormatInfo that represents the culture you want to parse the float as; this controls what characters are used for decimals, group separators, etc.
For example to ensure that the '.' character was treated as the decimal indicator you could pass in CultureInfo.InvariantCulture (this one is typically very useful in server applications where you tend to want things to be the same irrespective of the environment's culture).

Try to avoid float.Parse, use TryParse instead as it performs a lot better but does the same job.
this also applies to double, DateTime, etc...
(some types also offer TryParseExact which also performs even better!)

The source is an input from a website. I can't rely on it being valid. So I went with TryParse as mentioned before.
But I can't figure out how to give the currentCulture to it.
Also, this would give me the culture of the server it's currently running on, but since it's the world wide web, the user can be from anywhere...

you can know current Cuklture of your server with a simple statement:
System.Globalization.CultureInfo culture = System.Globalization.CultureInfo.CurrentCulture;
Note that there id a CurrentUICulture property, but UICulture is used from ResourceMeanager form multilanguages applications. for number formatting, you must considere CurrentCulture.
I hope this will help you

One approach is to force localization to use dot instead of comma separator - this way your code will work identically on all windows machines independently from selected language and settings.
This approach is applicable to small gained applications, like test applications, console applications and so on. For application, which was localization in use this is not so useful, but depends on requirements of application.
var CurrentCultureInfo = new CultureInfo("en", false);
CurrentCultureInfo.NumberFormat.NumberDecimalSeparator = ".";
CurrentCultureInfo.NumberFormat.CurrencyDecimalSeparator = ".";
Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentUICulture = CurrentCultureInfo;
Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = CurrentCultureInfo;
CultureInfo.DefaultThreadCurrentCulture = CurrentCultureInfo;
This code forces to use dot ('.') instead of comma, needs to be placed at application startup.

Since you don't know the web user's culture, you can do some guesswork. TryParse with a culture that uses , for separators and . for decimal, AND TryParse with a culture that uses . for separators and , for decimal. If they both succeed but yield different answers then you'll have to ask the user which they intended. Otherwise you can proceed normally, given your two equal results or one usable result or no usable result.