Auto complete text box

[Emma Etigu]

hello, am fairly new to VB. Net and am trying to develop an application. I want to implement auto complete function in one of my text boxes. I want my text box to show a list of items that are stored in my database when a user enters a particular letter.
thanks.

[Minimalist]

Just type autocomplete into the search box in the top right corner and you will find plenty of references.

[Reverend Jim]

Here is an example

Dim srce As New AutoCompleteStringCollection()
srce.AddRange({"January", "February", "March", "April", "May", "June",
              "July", "August", "September", "October", "November", "December"})

txtSample.AutoCompleteMode = AutoCompleteMode.Suggest
txtSample.AutoCompleteSource = AutoCompleteSource.CustomSource
txtSample.AutoCompleteCustomSource = srce

[Emma Etigu]

hi
thanks for your response but
in AddRange, should I include the dataset from which I want to display the values from.

thanks.

[Reverend Jim]

Iterate through the dataset and add the values to the source collection as in

Dim con As New SqlConnection("Server=.\SQLEXPRESS;Database=PUBS;Trusted_Connection=yes;")
Dim cmd As New SqlCommand("SELECT au_lname FROM authors", con)

con.Open()

Dim rdr As SqlDataReader = cmd.ExecuteReader

Dim srce As New AutoCompleteStringCollection()

Do While rdr.Read()
    srce.Add(rdr("au_lname"))
Loop

rdr.Close()
con.Close()

txtSample.AutoCompleteCustomSource = srce

[Reverend Jim]

Or using Linq you could do

Dim con As New SqlConnection("Server=.\SQLEXPRESS;Database=PUBS;Trusted_Connection=yes;")
Dim dat As New DataTable
Dim daa As New SqlDataAdapter("SELECT au_lname FROM authors", con)

con.Open()
daa.Fill(dat)
con.Close()

txtSample.AutoCompleteCustomSource.AddRange((From row In dat.Rows.Cast(Of DataRow)() Select CStr(row("au_lname"))).ToArray())

[Emma Etigu]

hi

thanks but my database is in access. but an trying to use your procedures if I succeed I will let u know.

[Emma Etigu]

hi

I figured it out but one problem though, my code is not picking data from exactly the database, its picking from a custom source.

dim r as Emma.emmadataset.items row=etc.rows

dim itemc  = from n in r.item name select n

txtsample.auto complete mode= autocompletemode.suggested

 txtsample.autocompletecustomsource.autocompletesource.custom source

txtsample.autocompletecustomsource.add(itemc.to array())

please advise.

[Reverend Jim]

I can't advise because I don't know what your custom source is. If you are using Access instead of MS SQL just use OleDb instead of SqlClient.