CODEWITHSUNDEEP
powershelldatetimedatetime-format
Aze Tod
Aze Tod

Reputation: 11

PowerShell get latest string date

I have a list with dates inside

$date = @('05-28-2020','09-30-2021')

I want to find the most recent date

I tried to convert string before comparat it :

[datetime]::ParseExact($date[0],'MM_dd_yyyy', $null)

But not working

Any ideas ?

Upvotes: 1

Views: 224

Answers (3)

mklement0
mklement0

Reputation: 437513

  • You can directly cast your date-time strings to [datetime] - no need for a ParseExact() call - given that your input format is recognized by the invariant culture that PowerShell always uses in casts.

  • System.Linq.Enumerable.Max<T>() allows you to find the maximum in a [datetime]-typed enumerable.

Therefore:

$date = @('05-28-2020','09-30-2021') # Note: The @(...) enclosure isn't strictly needed.

[Linq.Enumerable]::Max([datetime[]] $date)

On a US-English system, the above yields Thursday, September 30, 2021 12:00:00 AM, i.e. the default output formatting of the most recent date in the input, [datetime] '09-30-2021'.

As for what you tried:

  • As has been mentioned, the only immediate problem with your ParseExact() call was that you used _ instead of -.

  • Also note that passing $null as the third argument implies that the culture currently in effect is used during parsing (as reflected in [cultureinfo]::CurrentCulture; this won't matter with numeric formatting sequences such as MM, but it would with symbolic ones such as MMM - and potentially even with unquoted placeholders : and /.

Upvotes: 1

Revicx
Revicx

Reputation: 79

$date = @('05-28-2020','09-30-2021')
$max = '01-01-1999'
$date | ForEach-Object {
    if($_ -ge $max){
        $max = $_
    }
}

This should do the work.

Upvotes: 0

Philip Meholm
Philip Meholm

Reputation: 391

switch your _ to - and it will work: enter image description here

Upvotes: 0

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