I have an application that shows:

Date
Job Number
Quantity
Description

in a GridView.

Date, Job Number and Quantity are in one table. Description exists in a separate table linked by uniqueidentifier field like JobGuid. Description is 200 char long.

When I show the GridView, I use substring in my sp and show only the 1st 25 characters. Fields in my grid view are bound fields except for the description field that is a "link button" field. The purpose of this is to be able to click the description in the grid view and show the full 200 character text.

I was hoping to use a hidden field for the extended text in the GridView (in addidtion to the short description that I show) but read that you cannot retrieve value from hidden fields (visible = false). Somewhere I read you could convert the "link button" filed into a template field, make it hidden and be able to retrieve the value using "Find control" and hopefully display the full description in a tooltip. Is this a good way or are there better solutions (I am not good at dealing with CSS which would support a similar solution).

Note: When I have the GridView displayed I do not have the JobGuid key any longer that links the job table and the description table si I cannot easily retrieve the extended description.

Thank you for every suggestion.....

There are HTML attributes that can generate tool tips. I believe the "title" attribute on an <a> tag will create a tooltip.

If you make the hidden field not visible at the server side, it won't render. I can't imagine why one would do this however, as the hidden field is, well..., already hidden.

You could change the description field into a template column, put a hidden relative position div with the complete description and show it when you mouse over the truncated value.

-Peter
compiledthoughts.com