I was reviewing some code when I ran into code that fit this pattern all over the place (simplified to make a point).
string format = "/comments/{0}/{1}.aspx#";
string url = String.Format(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture, format + entity.Id, entity.ParentID, entity.Date.ToString("yyyy/MM/dd", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture));
There are a couple things I want you to notice here. The first is concatenation of the entity id to the end of the format string.
Second, notice format string passed into the ToString method of the the entity.Date.
entity.Date.ToString("yyyy/MM/dd", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture)
Ok I lied. There is a third thing I want you to notice - the fact that CultureInfo.InvariantCulture has to be specified twice.
My guess is the author of this code was in a hurry and didn’t realize the full power of format strings that can be passed to the String.Format method. It is possible to get all the formatting information in a single string. Here is how I rewrote this.
string format = "/comments/{0:yyyy/MM/dd}/{1}.aspx#{2}";
string url = String.Format(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture, format, entity.Date, entity.ParentId, entity.Id);
In this rewritten code, I took advantage of the fact that the String.Format method allows you to specify formatting information within the place holders like so.
In this way, the code does not need to call the ToString method of the DateTime instance. The formatting is all in a single format string and that is one less CultureInfo.InvariantCulture you need to type.
This helps make the code more readable and more flexible. The string format for this url is all in a single string.
A useful reference for string formats that I keep at my fingertips is the following blog post by Steve Tibbett. If you use format strings, you will find this reference invaluable.