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format datetime based on users culture

How can I format the date and time depending on the users region settings in an ASP.NET-MVC application without worrying about the order of the date?
For example, I want to have:
the day with a leading zero (dd);
month abbreviated three-letter form (MMM);
full year (yyyy);
the time just the hours and minutes both with leading zeros (HH:mm);
depending on if the user is from USA show AM/PM after the time;
Every country displays the date in a different order. USA displays first the month than days than years (MMM/dd/yyyy). In China first the year than month than day (yyyy-MMM-dd) (IIRC). And in Europe most countries display the date in this format: dd-MMM-yyyy.
And then not to mention the slashes/dashes used to separate the month, days and years from each other in every country.
This of course can be done with an endless if/else or switch statement, but isn't there a more elegant way to do this?
EDIT this is the best I came up with:
var cltr = System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture;
DateTime.Now.ToString(cltr.DateTimeFormat.ShortDatePattern + " " + cltr.DateTimeFormat.ShortTimePattern)
It displays the date in numbers only. How would I change that in short month notation but not changing the order and the separators etc?

You can get the culture currently used by the user with CurrentCulture and CurrentCultureInfo.
For more details, see: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bz9tc508.aspx

I think you are talking about formatting issue. Once you have your DateTime object, then you can display it as you want. You have to specify new CultureInfo("en-US") as IFormatProvider in the DateTime.ToString() method if you want to show the datetime as US format.

Datetime Formatting giving it a specific culture doesn't change how day is printed out

Is DateTime format strictly dependent on the language of the OS being used? Because the following doesn't work:
DateTime date = DateTime.Now;
var usCultureInfo = CultureInfo.CreateSpecificCulture("en-US");
Console.WriteLine(date.ToString("dddd MM-dd-yy"),usCultureInfo);
I'd like the result to print out as Saturday, 06-29-2013 but the day gets printed out in Korean 토요일, 06-29-2013.

You are a victim of Composite Formatting overload for Console.WriteLine where you could pass Format string and a series of object to be inserted in the placeholders of the format string
You need to write in this way
Console.WriteLine(date.ToString("dddd MM-dd-yy",usCultureInfo));
and you get the right day text.
See the specs here DateTime.ToString(format, IFormatProvider)

Or simply you can use
string abc=date.ToString("dddd MM-dd-yy");

Set specific date format in c# for windows phone

Relatively new Windows Phone developer here, looking for some help. Basically I'm messing around with an app that I'm looking to eventually put on the marketplace.
Basically the app is counting down to a specific date, I've got the countdown working with no problems, however i do have a problem with the date format as I'm in the UK and the date format is dd/MM/yyyy whereas the states is MM/dd/yyyy. So the app goes into negative figures for anyone in the US. Basically i need help with some sort of workaround, whether it's setting a universal date format for my app or something like that. Here is the code for the countdown:
DateTime startDate = DateTime.Now;
var launch = DateTime.Parse("01/08/2012 00:00:00 AM");
TimeSpan t = launch - startDate;
Countdown.Text = string.Format("\r {0}\r Days \r {1}\r Hours \r {2}\r Minutes \r {3}\r Seconds", t.Days, t.Hours, t.Minutes, t.Seconds);

If you’re hard-coding the date, then you should use the DateTime(int,int,int) constructor, rather than parsing it from a string. The three parameters would always be interpreted as year, month, day (in that order).
var launch = new DateTime(2012, 08, 11);

You can also parse and format dates for other cultures by setting the current culture or Using a CultureInfo to format the string.
See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/5hh873ya.aspx for more info.

The ToString() method for DateTime has an overload that takes a custom format string.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/8kb3ddd4.aspx
It would be fairly simple to ask for, or establish the users region, and send dates to him in the correct format.
Beyond that, there is an overload of ToString that takes a System.Globalization.CultureInfo object so you can do something like.
myDateTime.ToString(new System.Globalization.CultureInfo(Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture.Name));
This should give you the datetime formatted correctly for the users region based on OS settings.

custom date time format

i need to format date like "2010-04-21 11:35:22.440". can anyone help me?
the problem is i am seeing either 2009-06-15T13:45:30.0900000 or 2008-03-09 16:05:07Z but not the one i am looking for. thanks.

string formattedDate = dateTime.ToString("yyyy-MM-dd HH\\:mm\\:ss.fff");
Note that the case of MM and HH are important, MM is months, mm is minutes, and HH is 24h, vs hh being 12h.
Also notice the time separator is specified as \:, if you just use : it will use the time separator specified in your regional settings, which may not necessarily be a colon.

Custom Date and Time Format Strings link should point you in the right direction.

Use the format "yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss.fff" with the ToString of the date variable.
e.g:
Console.WriteLine(DateTime.Now.ToString("yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss.fff"));

DateTime Format like HH:mm 24 Hours without AM/PM

I was searching here about converting a string like "16:20" to a DateTime type without losing the format, I said I dont want to add dd/MM/yyy or seconds or AM/PM, because db just accept this format.
I tried with Cultures yet
Thanks in Advance

Just give a date format to your dateTime.
string DateFormat = "yyyy MM d " this willl give you the year month and day. after continuing;
string DateFormat = "yyyy MM d HH:mm:ss " in here the Capital H will give you the 24 hours time format and lowerCase "h" will give you the 12 hours time format...
when you give the Dateformat as a string you can do whatever you want with date and time.
string DateFormat = "yyyyMMdHHmmss";
string date = DateTime.Now.ToStrign(DateFormat);
OR
Console.writeline(DateTime.Now.ToStrign(DateFormat));
OUTPUT:
20120823132544

All DateTime objects must have a date and a time.
If you want just the time, use TimeSpan:
TimeSpan span = TimeSpan.Parse("16:20");
If you want a DateTime, add that time to the min value:
TimeSpan span = TimeSpan.Parse("16.20");
DateTime dt = DateTime.MinValue.Add(span);
// will get you 1/1/1900 4:20 PM which can be formatted with .ToString("HH:mm") for 24 hour formatting

DateTime.Now.ToString("hh:mm") - If it's C#.
Oh. Only read the header.
DateTime dt = new DateTime(2008, 12, 11, Convert.ToInt32("16"), Convert.ToInt32("32"), 0);

what do you mean by "losing the format".
if you convert it to a DateTime type, then the DateTime object will have dd/mm/yy and other properties. depending on how you plan to use the object, you can "recover" your original settings, by formatting the string output like this: DT.ToString("HH:mm");

Since you don't stipulate which DBMS you are using, it is hard to know which answer will help you. If you use IBM Informix Dynamic Server, you would simply use the data type 'DATETIME HOUR TO MINUTE', which will record values in the 24 hour clock.

DateTime.Parse("16:20")

I want to address this part of your question:
without losing the format
A database will generally store all datetime values in a standard common format that's not even human readable. If you use a datetime column the original format is destroyed.
However, when you retrieve the value you cast it back to any format you want. If you want HH:mm you can get it.