Bending .NET PropertyGrid to your will with a Custom Type Editor






2.41/5 (14 votes)
Jan 13, 2004

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Example of using the propertybag class of Tony Allowatt in vb.net with a custom type editor
Introduction
I've had serious trouble doing these two things:
- Using a propertygrid and having all of its properties (like the names of the properties, and description that is shown) dynamic, in VB.NET
- Using Tony Allowat's classes (which solves the first problem) with a custom type editor
I finally managed to get things working ... and thought that others amongst you could be having the same problem as I ... So here it is, my working VB.NET version of Tony Allowatt's propertybag classes, implementing a custom type editor.
Background
I didn't write the code of the PropertyBag.vb file ... Tony Allowatt wrote these usefull classes for the propertygrid, but in C#. Read his article first! Bending the .NET PropertyGrid to Your Will
Using the code
I'm not going to explain much in here, as all the serious code has been explained by Tony Allowatt in his article. I only provide an example of how to use his classes with a custom editor.
Public Class MyOwnClass
' the class that will be shown in the propertygrid
' it has a property of typ MultiLineString
End Class
Public Class MultiLineString
' this is the custom type we'll want to edit in the propertygrid
' it's just a class with 1 property, a string, but
' we want a multiline editor for it
' ...
End Class
Public Class MultiLineStringEditor
Inherits UITypeEditor
' ...
End Class
Public Class MultiLineStringConverter
Inherits System.ComponentModel.TypeConverter
' ...
End Class
Public Class MultiLineStringEditorForm
Inherits System.Windows.Forms.Form
' ...
End Class
Points of interest
Some interesting links:
- http://www.codeguru.com/columns/VB/PK032902.html
- MSDN Online has a great example about the propertygrid too (in c#)
History
- 14-01-2004 - Initial Release