Change default format for DateTime parsing in ASP.NET Core

Question

I get a Date in an ASP.NET Core Controller like this:

public class MyController:Controller{
    public IActionResult Test(DateTime date) {

    }
}

Answer 1

Try setting the culture manually in your web.config

<configuration>
   <system.web>    
      <globalization culture="de-DE" uiCulture="de-DE"/>
   </system.web>
</configuration>

EDIT: Since i just realized this is Core, you can do it this way in StartUp.Configure:

var cultureInfo = new CultureInfo("de-DE");
CultureInfo.DefaultThreadCurrentCulture = cultureInfo;
CultureInfo.DefaultThreadCurrentUICulture = cultureInfo;

Answer 2

If you don't mind using the generic StatusCode method to make this call, you can do something like the following:

internal IActionResult CreateResponse(int code, object content = null)
    {
        Type t = content?.GetType();
        bool textContent = t == typeof(string) || t == typeof(bool);
        //
        JsonSerializerSettings dateFormatSettings = new JsonSerializerSettings
        {

            DateFormatString = myDateFormat
        };

        string bodyContent = content == null || string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(content + "")
                    ? null
                    : textContent
                        ? content + ""
                        : JsonConvert.SerializeObject(content, dateFormatSettings);

        ObjectResult or = base.StatusCode(code, bodyContent);
        string mediaType = 
                    !textContent
                        ? "application/json"
                        : "text/plain";
        or.ContentTypes.Add(new MediaTypeHeaderValue(mediaType));
        return or;
    }

You can add this to a base class and call it like:

return base.CreateResponse(StatusCodes.Status200OK, new { name = "My Name", age = 23});

It's up to you if you want to create your own Ok, BadRequest, etc...methods, but for me this works and I hope it helps anybody else. You could even default int code = 200, if most of your requests are GETs. This code assumes you either want to respond with a string, boolean, or a custom object, but you can easily handle all primitives by checking Type.GetTypeInfo().IsPrimitive and even doing some checks for decimal, string, DateTime, TimeSpan, DateTimeOffset, or Guid.

Answer 3

I had same problem ad almost got mad. I tried everthing with no sucsses. First I found a workaround to solve part of my problem:

Workaround:

string data1 
string horainicio 
string horafim

var ageData = new AgendaData();
var user = await _userManager.GetUserAsync(User);
string usuario = user.Id;
int empresa = user.IdEmpresa;
int Idprospect = Convert.ToInt32(prospect);
int minutos = 0;           
var tipoAgenda = TipoAgenda.Contato;

var provider = CultureInfo.InvariantCulture;
provider = new CultureInfo("en-US");            
string formato = "dd/MM/yyyy HH:mm";

var dataInicio = DateTime.ParseExact(data1 + " " + horainicio, formato, provider);
var dataFim = DateTime.ParseExact(data1 + " " + horafim, formato, provider);           
var dataAlerta = dataInicio.AddMinutes(-minutos);

But, this way i aways have to set invariantculture to all my datetime. I found the solution setting my culture at the configure on startup.cs.

Set Culture on startup.cs

 public void Configure(IApplicationBuilder app, IHostingEnvironment env, ILoggerFactory loggerFactory, CRMContext context)
        {
            loggerFactory.AddConsole(Configuration.GetSection("Logging"));
            loggerFactory.AddDebug();

            if (env.IsDevelopment())
            {
                app.UseDeveloperExceptionPage();
                app.UseDatabaseErrorPage();
                app.UseBrowserLink();
            }
            else
            {
                app.UseExceptionHandler("/Home/Error");
            }

            //Fixar Cultura para en-US
            RequestLocalizationOptions localizationOptions = new RequestLocalizationOptions
            {
                SupportedCultures = new List<CultureInfo> { new CultureInfo("en-US") },
                SupportedUICultures = new List<CultureInfo> { new CultureInfo("en-US") },
                DefaultRequestCulture = new RequestCulture("en-US")
            };

            app.UseRequestLocalization(localizationOptions);      
            app.UseStaticFiles();
            app.UseIdentity();

            // Add external authentication middleware below. To configure them please see https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=532715

            app.UseMvc(routes =>
            {
                routes.MapRoute(
                    name: "default",
                    template: "{controller=Home}/{action=Index}/{id?}");
            });

            context.Database.EnsureCreated();
        }

Hope this help you.

Answer 4

I wanted to format the dates in my responses and I did the following in ConfigureServices method:

services.AddMvc()
.AddJsonOptions(options =>
{
    options.SerializerSettings.DateFormatString = "mm/dd/yy, ffffdd";
});

Hope that helps.