C# string format flag or modifier to lowercase param

Question

Is it possible to specify some kind of flag or modifier on a string format param to make it lower case or upper case?

Example of what I want:

String.         


        

Answer 1

There's only padding and allignment formating... So the easy way is like you said, use "John".ToUpper() or "John".ToLower().

Another solution could be create a custom IFormatProvider, to provide the string format you want.

This is how will look the IFormatProvider and the string.Format call.

public class CustomStringFormat : IFormatProvider, ICustomFormatter
{
    public object GetFormat(Type formatType)
    {
        if (formatType == typeof(ICustomFormatter))
            return this;
        else
            return null;

    }

    public string Format(string format, object arg, IFormatProvider formatProvider)
    {
        string result = arg.ToString();

        switch (format.ToUpper())
        {
            case "U": return result.ToUpper();
            case "L": return result.ToLower();
            //more custom formats
            default: return result;
        }
    }
}

And the call will look like:

String.Format(new CustomStringFormat(), "Hi {0:U}", "John");

Answer 2

In short, no; AFAIK you'd have to fix the source values, or use your own replacement to string.Format. Note that if you are passing in a custom culture (to string.Format) you may want to use culture.TextInfo.ToLower(s), rather than just s.ToLower().