Question

I have a SmallDateTime field in my Sql Server 2008 database to store users Birthdays.

On my ‘Edit Profile’ web page, I have a standard textbox which I want to bind the ‘Birthday’ date to (excluding the time as this is not required). At present I am binding to the textbox but it is rendering the full Date and Time.

In addition, when the user updates their profile, I want to be able to validate the Birthday textbox, ensuring that the value specified complies to dd/mm/yyyy, and any deviation from that is highlighted via my existing validation summary on the page.

How do I go about:

a) configuring the Birthday property in my ViewModel to display in dd/mm/yyyy format (excluding the time).

b) validate Birthday (based on dd/mm/yyyy format) when the user submits the form?

Answer 1

[DisplayFormat(DataFormatString="{0:dd/MM/yyyy}", ApplyFormatInEditMode=true)]
public DateTime DateOfBirth { get; set; }

This should give you the automatic formatting on the field (without you having to manually do it) and also the validation.