TimeSpan will not parse some strings

Question

I'm not sure what's going on here, but it will accept some timespans, but not others. Can someone show me a way to check for a vaild time span in this format 99:59:59.

//50:30:00 is bad
//50:20:00 is good

try
{
    TimeSpan ts = new TimeSpan();
    ts = TimeSpan.Parse("50:30:00");
}
catch //(Exception ex)
{
    MessageBox.Show("bad time span");
}

`50:30:00` is bad while `50:20:00` is good ? doesn't make sense. — Raptor, Mar 25 '13 at 04:30
possible duplicate of [How to parse string with hours greater than 24 to TimeSpan?](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2728321/how-to-parse-string-with-hours-greater-than-24-to-timespan) — Raptor, Mar 25 '13 at 04:31
I saw that, but I thought there's a chance this is a bug, so I decided to post it. — Rikki B, Mar 25 '13 at 04:32
I mean that 50:30:00 will throw the exception while 50:20:00 will not. — Rikki B, Mar 25 '13 at 04:33

Jason Watkins · Accepted Answer · 2013-07-25T03:41:21.283

6

By default, the Timespan.Parse method assumes that the time is int the format Days:Hours:Minutes. Since you can't have more than 24 hours in a day, it throws when the Hours component is greater than 24.

I have to admit I'm a bit surprised that Timespan.Parse won't do the conversion for you. I have a hunch it has something to do with the fact that not all days are 24 hours long.

edited Jul 25 '13 at 03:41

answered Mar 25 '13 at 04:32

Jason Watkins

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That doesn't explain why it will accept 48:00:00 or 50:20:00 though. Can you explain that to me? – Rikki B Mar 25 '13 at 04:35
3

Sure it does. `48:00:00` is read as "48 days, 0 hours, 0 minutes" (legal). `50:20:00` is read as "50 days, 20 hours, 0 minutes" (legal). `50:30:00` is read as "50 days, 30 hours, 0 minutes" (not legal). Days can't have 30 hours in them, so it throws and exception. – Jason Watkins Mar 25 '13 at 04:38
Ah thanks for that I understand how it's working now. I couldn't understand it. – Rikki B Mar 25 '13 at 04:39

TimeSpan will not parse some strings

1 Answers1