Using GridView in ASP.NET & C# — PART 1

Using GridView in ASP.NET & C# — PART 1

GridView displays the values of a data source in a table where each column represents a field and each row represents a record. The GridView control enables you to select, sort, and edit these items. In this article I would discuss some basic scenarios using GridView.

Example 1: Bind the Gridview with DataSet

Step 1: Create a new ASP.NET Web Application in Visual Studio

Step 2: I am using AdventureWorks for my samples. Open web.config and add following entry to connection strings element

<add name="Sql" connectionString="Data Source=<SERVERNAME>;

Initial Catalog= AdventureWorks;User=testuser;Password=testuser;"

providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/>

Step 3: Open aspx file in design mode and add the following in div tag

<asp:gridview id="gvProducts"

autogeneratecolumns="False"

emptydatatext="No data available."

runat="server" DataKeyNames="ProductID">

<Columns>

<asp:BoundField DataField="ProductID" HeaderText="Product ID"/>

<asp:BoundField DataField="Name" HeaderText="Product Name" />

<asp:BoundField DataField="ProductNumber" HeaderText="Product Number" />

<asp:BoundField HeaderText="Price"

DataField="ListPrice"

DataFormatString="{0:c}">

<ItemStyle HorizontalAlign="Right"></ItemStyle>

</asp:BoundField>

</Columns>

</asp:gridview>

Name	Description
AllowPaging	Gets or sets a value indicating whether the paging feature is enabled.
autogeneratecolumns	Gets or sets a value indicating whether bound fields are automatically created for each field in the data source.
emptydatatext	Gets or sets the text to display in the empty data row rendered when a GridView control is bound to a data source that does not contain any records.
DataKeyNames	Gets or sets an array that contains the names of the primary key fields for the items displayed in a GridView control.
BoundField	Displays the value of a field in a data source. This is the default column type of the GridView control.
BoundField -> DataField	Gets or sets the name of the data field to bind to the BoundField object.
BoundField -> HeaderText	Gets or sets the text that is displayed in the header of a data control
BoundField -> DataFormatString	Gets or sets the string that specifies the display format for the value of the field.
ItemStyle	Gets the style of any text-based content displayed by a data control field.

Step 4: Open Default.aspx.cs and add the following code in the page_load function

//fetch the connection string from web.config

string connString = ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings["Sql"].ConnectionString;

//SQL statement to fetch 10 entries from product category

string sql = @"Select top 10  P.ProductID, P.Name,

P.ProductNumber, ListPrice from Production.Product P

where ProductSubcategoryID is not null";

DataSet dsResults = new DataSet();

//Open SQL Connection

using (SqlConnection conn = new SqlConnection(connString))

{

conn.Open();

//Initialize command object

using (SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand(sql, conn))

{

SqlDataAdapter adapter = new SqlDataAdapter(cmd);

//Fill the result set

adapter.Fill(dsResults);

}

}

//Bind the grid view

gvProducts.DataSource = dsResults;

gvProducts.DataBind();

Step 5: Run the application

Output:

Example 2: Bind the GridView with SQL DataReader

Step 1: Repeat Steps 1 to Step 3 from “Bind the Gridview with DataSet” section

Step 2: Open Default.aspx.cs and add the following code in the page_load function

//fetch the connection string from web.config

string connString = ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings["Sql"].ConnectionString;

//SQL statement to fetch 10 entries from product category

string sql = @"Select top 10  P.ProductID, P.Name,

P.ProductNumber, ListPrice from Production.Product P

where ProductSubcategoryID is not null";

SqlDataReader reader = null;

//Open SQL Connection

using (SqlConnection conn = new SqlConnection(connString))

{

conn.Open();

//Initialize command object

using (SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand(sql, conn))

{

reader = cmd.ExecuteReader();

//Bind the grid view

gvProducts.DataSource = reader;

gvProducts.DataBind();    }

}

Step 3: Run the application.

Output