SByte.Parse converts string in a culture-specific format to its 8-bit signed integer
Imports System.Globalization Module Example Public Sub Main() Dim nf As New NumberFormatInfo() nf.NegativeSign = "~" Dim values() As String = { "-1", "+12", "~16", " 1", "~255" } Dim providers() As IFormatProvider = { nf, CultureInfo.InvariantCulture } For Each provider As IFormatProvider In providers Console.WriteLine("Conversions using {0}:", CObj(provider).GetType().Name) For Each value As String In values Try Console.WriteLine(" Converted '{0}' to {1}.", _ value, SByte.Parse(value, provider)) Catch e As FormatException Console.WriteLine(" Unable to parse '{0}'.", value) Catch e As OverflowException Console.WriteLine(" '{0}' is out of range of the SByte type.", value) End Try Next Next End Sub End Module