Sorting a Listbox

Colonel Angus · February 20th, 2004, 04:06 PM

I'm trying to sort the items in a listbox. So far, I have this Sub:

Code:

Sub SortListbox(ByRef box As ListBox)
        Dim sortedItems As New SortedList
        Dim i As Integer

        For i = 1 To box.Items.Count - 1
            sortedItems.Add(box.Items(i).Text, box.Items(i).Value)
        Next
        box.Items.Clear()
        box.DataSource = sortedItems
        box.DataTextField = "LinkText"
        box.DataValueField = "id"
        box.DataBind()
    End Sub

This greets me with the friendly error:
"DataBinder.Eval: 'System.Collections.DictionaryEntry' does not contain a property with the name LinkText."

Am I on the right track? I think I'm really close.

-Colonel

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
In God we trust, everything else we test.

bmains · February 20th, 2004, 11:45 PM

You can bind a listbox to the SortedList object because it is a collection. I think that the fields that you specify ("LinkText" and "id") aren't the fields you need to bind to. Looking at the MSDN, I think you may want to try to reference it to the "key" field and the "value" field. I don't know if that will work; the SortedList collection isn't as straightforward as some of the other collection classes are.

Sorry I couldn't be more help; hopefully someone else will give you a better answer.

Brian

Colonel Angus · February 23rd, 2004, 10:19 AM

Actually, Brian, I had persued that avenue, and while I didn't receive an error, the functionality wasn't there.

Here's what I used:

Code:

Sub SortListbox(ByRef box As ListBox)
        Dim sortedItems As New SortedList
        Dim i As Integer

        For i = 1 To box.Items.Count - 1
            sortedItems.Add(box.Items(i).Text, box.Items(i).Value)
        Next
        box.Items.Clear()
        box.DataSource = sortedItems
        box.DataTextField = "key"
        box.DataValueField = "value"
        box.DataBind()
    End Sub

I'm overwriting and not sorting. This needs work...
I'm open to suggestions!

- Colonel

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
In God we trust, everything else we test.

Colonel Angus · February 23rd, 2004, 10:42 AM

I was able to dig up a solution. You can find it at:
http://www.411asp.net/func/content?t...box&id=5881410

I was a bit suprised to have such a simple concept be implemented in such a way. Hopefully Whidbey gets on board with this concept for sorting listboxes!

- Colonel

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
In God we trust, everything else we test.