How to: Search Strings Using String Methods (C# Programming Guide)
Visual Studio 2010
The string type, which is an alias for the System.String class, provides a number of useful methods for searching the contents of a string.
The following example uses the IndexOf, LastIndexOf, StartsWith, and EndsWith methods to search the strings.
class StringSearch { static void Main() { string str = "Extension methods have all the capabilities of regular static methods."; // Write the string and include the quotation marks. System.Console.WriteLine("\"{0}\"", str); // Simple comparisons are always case sensitive! bool test1 = str.StartsWith("extension"); System.Console.WriteLine("Starts with \"extension\"? {0}", test1); // For user input and strings that will be displayed to the end user, // use the StringComparison parameter on methods that have it to specify how to match strings. bool test2 = str.StartsWith("extension", System.StringComparison.CurrentCultureIgnoreCase); System.Console.WriteLine("Starts with \"extension\"? {0} (ignoring case)", test2); bool test3 = str.EndsWith(".", System.StringComparison.CurrentCultureIgnoreCase); System.Console.WriteLine("Ends with '.'? {0}", test3); // This search returns the substring between two strings, so // the first index is moved to the character just after the first string. int first = str.IndexOf("methods") + "methods".Length; int last = str.LastIndexOf("methods"); string str2 = str.Substring(first, last - first); System.Console.WriteLine("Substring between \"methods\" and \"methods\": '{0}'", str2); // Keep the console window open in debug mode System.Console.WriteLine("Press any key to exit."); System.Console.ReadKey(); } } /* Output: "Extension methods have all the capabilities of regular static methods." Starts with "extension"? False Starts with "extension"? True (ignoring case) Ends with '.'? True Substring between "methods" and "methods": ' have all the capabilities of regular static ' Press any key to exit. */