String.Compare Method (System)

MSDN Library
.NET Development
Previous Versions
.NET Framework 2.0
Class Library Reference
System
String Class
String Methods

Compare Method

Compare Method (String, String)
Compare Method (String, String, Boolean)
Compare Method (String, String, StringComparison)
Compare Method (String, String, Boolean, CultureInfo)
Compare Method (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32)
Compare Method (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32, Boolean)
Compare Method (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32, StringComparison)
Compare Method (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32, Boolean, CultureInfo)

String.Compare Method
This page is specific to:.NET Framework Version:1.12.03.0 3.5 Silverlight 3 4.0

.NET Framework Class Library

String.Compare Method

Compares two specified String objects.

Overload List

Name	Description
String.Compare (String, String)	Compares two specified String objects. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.
String.Compare (String, String, Boolean)	Compares two specified String objects, ignoring or honoring their case. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.
String.Compare (String, String, StringComparison)	Compares two specified String objects. A parameter specifies whether the comparison uses the current or invariant culture, honors or ignores case, and uses word or ordinal sort rules. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.
String.Compare (String, String, Boolean, CultureInfo)	Compares two specified String objects, ignoring or honoring their case, and using culture-specific information to influence the comparison. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.
String.Compare (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32)	Compares substrings of two specified String objects. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.
String.Compare (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32, Boolean)	Compares substrings of two specified String objects, ignoring or honoring their case. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.
String.Compare (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32, StringComparison)	Compares substrings of two specified String objects. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.
String.Compare (String, Int32, String, Int32, Int32, Boolean, CultureInfo)	Compares substrings of two specified String objects, ignoring or honoring their case, and using culture-specific information to influence the comparison. Supported by the .NET Compact Framework.

Reference

String Class
String Members
System Namespace
Int32 Structure
CompareOrdinal
CompareTo

Community Content

Please specify what kind of comparison you expect :) Use StringComparison or CultureInfo!

Added by:Shawn Steele [MSFT]

Please specify what kind of comparison you expect :) Use StringComparison, or CultureInfo if necessary

Some applications need linguistic comparisons, others need ordinal type comparisons. A very general rule would be that user facing comparisons would need linguistic comparisons (use current culture), and security comparisons may need ordinal or ordinal ignore case. For some applilcations the default comparisons will not be appropriate. It is much better to understand the differences and use the correct version.

Additionally note that it is challenging to try to figure out what is going to be a match for the file system, URI/IRIs, etc. It is generally preferable to use the specific comparisons for the resource you're trying to compare. For example ?, & and other escaping rules in URLs, ..\, .\, :, etc in file names, etc. could all cause unexpected behavior if not properly tested for.

Comparison Results

Added by:Mike Hohm

I'm not sure why this is not already posted, but here is the logic table for the comparison results in general:

parameter 1 < parameter 2 = -1

parameter 1 > parameter 2 = 1

parameter 1 = parameter 2 = 0

The linked documents tell more. I'm not sure why I need to click on each overload, unless one returns different values. If that is the case, it probably needs a seperate method name.