How do I parse a string with a decimal point to a double?

Question

I want to parse a string like \"3.5\" to a double. However,

double.Parse(\"3.5\") 

yields 35 and

double.Pars         


        

Answer 1

Look, every answer above that proposes writing a string replacement by a constant string can only be wrong. Why? Because you don't respect the region settings of Windows! Windows assures the user to have the freedom to set whatever separator character s/he wants. S/He can open up the control panel, go into the region panel, click on advanced and change the character at any time. Even during your program run. Think of this. A good solution must be aware of this.

So, first you will have to ask yourself, where this number is coming from, that you want to parse. If it's coming from input in the .NET Framework no problem, because it will be in the same format. But maybe it was coming from outside, maybe from a external server, maybe from an old DB that only supports string properties. There, the db admin should have given a rule in which format the numbers are to be stored. If you know for example that it will be an US DB with US format you can use this piece of code:

CultureInfo usCulture = new CultureInfo("en-US");
NumberFormatInfo dbNumberFormat = usCulture.NumberFormat;
decimal number = decimal.Parse(db.numberString, dbNumberFormat);

This will work fine anywhere on the world. And please don't use 'Convert.ToXxxx'. The 'Convert' class is thought only as a base for conversions in any direction. Besides: You may use the similar mechanism for DateTimes too.