Textbox - Currency without "$"

[BrailleSchool]

Hi, all,

I am wanting to display currency in a TextBox, but without the "$".
Also, if the end user types in a negative sign before the numbers, the entire amount is surrounded in ().
I have the first part working, but I am unable to get the "$" to go away.

StartingBalanceAsset.Text = Convert.ToDecimal(StartingBalanceAsset.Text).ToString("C2")

The above works without an issue.
If I type in 123456, the value is then converted to $123,456.00
If I type in -123456, the value is then converted to ($123,456.00)

I tried to use the following to remove the "$" and nothing happens. No errors either.

StartingBalanceAsset.Text.Replace("$", String.Empty)

Any suggestions?

[jmcilhinney]

The "C" format specifier is specifically for currency. If you don't want currency, which you don't if you don't want a currency symbol, then don't use "C". Use the format specifier that provides just the desired decimal and group (thousand) separators, which will presumably be "N" or "F".

[jmcilhinney]

I'm not sure whether "C" also inherently uses parentheses for negative values while "N" and "F" do not but, if that is the case, you can simply provide an appropriate NumberFormatInfo when calling ToString.

[Avaion]

Wouldn't the Format "D" Work since it would still contain the Decimal places just without the $?

[BrailleSchool]

Wouldn't the Format "D" Work since it would still contain the Decimal places just without the $?

I am not familiar with many of the formats, but i'll check into it.
I haven't coded in a while, so getting back into the swing of things.
Thanks for the possibility.

[jmcilhinney]

Wouldn't the Format "D" Work since it would still contain the Decimal places just without the $?

"D" is supported by integral types only and the result is an integer value with no decimal places. I know that "F" and "N" will work and I think that "G" will too.

[techgnome]

F2 should give you a decimal number with 2 places.

-tg

[Evil_Giraffe]

Sounds like you need a custom format string so that you can specify different behaviour for positive and negative numbers ( http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...ctionSeparator ). Unfortunately, this means AFAIK that you cannot then use standard format specifiers, so you need to define each one with custom specifiers:

Module Module1
 
    Sub Main()
        Dim numbers = {1, 123, 1234, 123456.0, -1, -123, -1234, -123456.0, -123456789}
 
        For Each number In numbers
            Console.WriteLine("{0:#,##0.00;(#,##0.00)}", number)
        Next
        Console.ReadLine()
    End Sub
 
End Module

[edit: so your code will want to look something like this:

StartingBalanceAsset.Text = Convert.ToDecimal(StartingBalanceAsset.Text).ToString("#,##0.00;(#,##0.00)")

[Evil_Giraffe]

Or, having played with this a bit more... supposing you want to keep the rest of the current culture's settings... (e.g. european countries' use of "," as the decimal point, etc, which the above code does not do)

First of all Clone the current locale's NumberFormatInfo, and override the CurrencySymbol to be blank, and CurrencyNegativePattern and CurrencyPositivePattern to be 0 (for what these values mean see here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...vs.110%29.aspx and http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...vs.110%29.aspx ). This will let you use the "C" standard formatter as long as you pass the cloned and altered numberformatinfo object. Because you've only overridden certain aspects, the thousands separator and so on will still match what the user has set as their preference.

Console app for demonstration, note how the French culture comes out with spaces for the separator and "," for the decimal point:

Module Module1
 
    Sub Main()
 
        Dim usCulture = System.Globalization.CultureInfo.GetCultureInfo("en-US")
        Dim ukCulture = System.Globalization.CultureInfo.GetCultureInfo("en-GB")
        Dim frCulture = System.Globalization.CultureInfo.GetCultureInfo("fr-FR")
 
        Dim baseCultures = {usCulture, ukCulture, frCulture}
 
        For Each baseCulture In baseCultures
 
            System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture = baseCulture
 
            Dim numbers = {1, 123, 1234, 123456.0, -1, -123, -1234, -123456.0, -123456789}
            Dim numberFormat = System.Globalization.NumberFormatInfo.CurrentInfo.Clone
            numberFormat.CurrencySymbol = ""
            numberFormat.CurrencyNegativePattern = 0
            numberFormat.CurrencyPositivePattern = 0
 
            For Each number In numbers
                Console.WriteLine(number.ToString("C"))
                Console.WriteLine(number.ToString("C", numberFormat))
            Next
 
        Next
        Console.ReadLine()
    End Sub
 
End Module