How do you compare DateTime objects using a specified tolerance in C#?

Question

By default C# compares DateTime objects to the 100ns tick. However, my database returns DateTime values to the nearest millisecond. What\'s the best way to compare two DateT

Answer 1

I had a similar problem as the original questioner but to make things more interesting I was saving and retrieving Nullable.

I liked joshperry's answer and extended it to work for my purposes:

public static class DateTimeTolerance
{
    private static TimeSpan _defaultTolerance = TimeSpan.FromMilliseconds(10); // 10ms default resolution
    public static void SetDefault(TimeSpan tolerance)
    {
        _defaultTolerance = tolerance;
    }

    public static DateTimeWithin Within(this DateTime dateTime, TimeSpan tolerance)
    {
        return new DateTimeWithin(dateTime, tolerance);
    }

    public static DateTimeWithin Within(this DateTime dateTime)
    {
        return new DateTimeWithin(dateTime, _defaultTolerance);
    }

    // Additional overload that can deal with Nullable dates
    // (treats null as DateTime.MinValue)
    public static DateTimeWithin Within(this DateTime? dateTime)
    {
        return dateTime.GetValueOrDefault().Within();
    }

    public static DateTimeWithin Within(this DateTime? dateTime, TimeSpan tolerance)
    {
        return dateTime.GetValueOrDefault().Within(tolerance);
    }
}

public class DateTimeWithin
{
    public DateTimeWithin(DateTime dateTime, TimeSpan tolerance)
    {
        DateTime = dateTime;
        Tolerance = tolerance;
    }

    public TimeSpan Tolerance { get; private set; }
    public DateTime DateTime { get; private set; }

    public static bool operator ==(DateTime lhs, DateTimeWithin rhs)
    {
        return (lhs - rhs.DateTime).Duration() <= rhs.Tolerance;
    }

    public static bool operator !=(DateTime lhs, DateTimeWithin rhs)
    {
        return (lhs - rhs.DateTime).Duration() > rhs.Tolerance;
    }

    public static bool operator ==(DateTimeWithin lhs, DateTime rhs)
    {
        return rhs == lhs;
    }

    public static bool operator !=(DateTimeWithin lhs, DateTime rhs)
    {
        return rhs != lhs;
    }

    // Overloads that can deal with Nullable dates
    public static bool operator !=(DateTimeWithin lhs, DateTime? rhs)
    {
        return rhs != lhs;
    }

    public static bool operator ==(DateTime? lhs, DateTimeWithin rhs)
    {
        if (!lhs.HasValue && rhs.DateTime == default(DateTime)) return true;
        if (!lhs.HasValue) return false;
        return (lhs.Value - rhs.DateTime).Duration() <= rhs.Tolerance;
    }

    public static bool operator !=(DateTime? lhs, DateTimeWithin rhs)
    {
        if (!lhs.HasValue && rhs.DateTime == default(DateTime)) return true;
        if (!lhs.HasValue) return false;
        return (lhs.Value - rhs.DateTime).Duration() > rhs.Tolerance;
    }

    public static bool operator ==(DateTimeWithin lhs, DateTime? rhs)
    {
        return rhs == lhs;
    }
}

And a quick unit test to verify everything is working correctly:

[TestMethod]
public void DateTimeExtensions_Within_WorksWithNullable()
{
    var now = DateTime.Now;
    var dtNow1 = new DateTime?(now);
    var dtNow2 = new DateTime?(now.AddMilliseconds(1));
    var dtNowish = new DateTime?(now.AddMilliseconds(25));
    DateTime? dtNull = null;

    Assert.IsTrue(now == dtNow1.Within()); // Compare DateTime to DateTime?
    Assert.IsTrue(dtNow1 == dtNow2.Within()); // Compare two DateTime? using a different syntax
    Assert.IsTrue(dtNow1 == dtNow2.Within()); // Same value should be true
    Assert.IsFalse(dtNow1 == dtNowish.Within()); // Outside of the default 10ms tolerance, should not be equal
    Assert.IsTrue(dtNow1 == dtNowish.Within(TimeSpan.FromMilliseconds(50))); // ... but we can override this
    Assert.IsFalse(dtNow1 == dtNull.Within()); // Comparing a value to null should be false
    Assert.IsTrue(dtNull == dtNull.Within()); // ... but two nulls should be true
}