Visual Basic 2008 Tutorial

16.1 Formatting Date and time using predefined formats

Date and time can be formatted using predefined formats and also user-defined formats.  The predefined formats of date and time are shown in Table 16.1.

 Table 16.1 Predefined formats of date and time

* Instead of "General date", you can also use the abbreviated  format "G" , i.e.  Format (Now, "G"). And for "Long Time", you can use the abbreviated  format "T". As for "Short Time", you may use the abbreviated  format "t"

Example 16.1

Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
Label1.Text = Format(Now, "General Date")
Label2.Text = Format(Now, "Long Date")
Label3.Text = Format(Now, "short Date")
Label4.Text = Format(Now, "Long Time")
Label5.Text = Format(Now, "Short Time")
End Sub

The output is shown in the diagram below:

16.2 Formatting Date and time using user-defined formats

Beside using the predefined  formats, you can also use the user-defined formatting functions. The general format of a user-defined for date/time is

          Format (expression,style)

Table 16.2 Some of the user-defined format functions for  date and time

 Example 16.2

 Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click, Button2.Click, Button3.Click

Label1.Text = Format(Now, "M")
Label2.Text = Format(Now, "MM")
Label3.Text = Format(Now, "MMM")
Label4.Text = Format(Now, "MMMM")
Label5.Text = Format(Now, "dd/MM/yyyy")
Label6.Text = Format(Now, "MMM,d,yyyy")
Label7.Text = Format(Now, "h:mm:ss tt")
Label8.Text = Format(Now, "MM/dd/yyyy h:mm:ss tt")

End Sub

The output is shown in the diagram below: