Placing database items into a list box

hookenbook · August 15th, 2008, 03:46 PM

I am attempting to fill a listbox with records from a database table and cannot seem to figure it out.
I understand how to use listbox.items.add(xxx)to place items in the listbox manually . I just cant seem to figure out how to add a datasource and automatically pull the list from a particular field in the table. I have tried and tried...maybe my head is just overloaded at the moment...I'm going to take a break for now...any help and an example would be greatly appreciated! thank you

Apocolypse2005 · October 12th, 2008, 04:06 PM

I think you should take a look at the data binding properties of a listbox along with the data source and binder controls. And maybe some msdn articles to go with them.

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Apocolypse2005, I'm a programmer - of sorts.

VBNewB · January 14th, 2009, 08:56 PM

Here's an example of how to populate a list box with data from the Northwind database which comes with MS Access. Coincidentally this was an exercise in Theron Willis' Beginning Visual Basic 2005 Databases (Chapter2, Exercise 1). Thanks to Mr. Willis for this book, it has been a great help to me!

Code:

Imports System.Data
Imports System.Data.OleDb
 
PublicClass Form1
 
 PrivateSub Form1_Load(ByVal sender AsObject, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) HandlesMe.Load
 
      'Create a connection to the database
      Dim strConnection AsString = "Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;Data Source=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office11\Samples\Northwind.mdb;"
      Dim objConnection AsNew OleDbConnection(strConnection)
 
      'Open the connection with error handling
      Try
           objConnection.Open()
      Catch OleDbExceptionErr As OleDbException
           MessageBox.Show(OleDbExceptionErr.Message)
      Catch InvalidOperationErr As InvalidOperationException
           MessageBox.Show(InvalidOperationErr.Message)
      EndTry
 
      'Create a command object with the SQL statement needed to select the first and last names
      Dim strSQL AsString = "SELECT FirstName, LastName FROM Employees"
      Dim objCommand AsNew OleDbCommand(strSQL, objConnection)
 
      'Create a data adapter and data table then fill the data table
      Dim objDataAdapter AsNew OleDbDataAdapter(objCommand)
      Dim objDataTable AsNew DataTable("Employees")
      objDataAdapter.Fill(objDataTable)
 
      'Create connection and release resources
      objConnection.Close()
      objConnection.Dispose()
      objConnection = Nothing
      objCommand.Dispose()
      objCommand = Nothing
      objDataAdapter.Dispose()
      objDataAdapter = Nothing
 
      'Fill names into the listbox
      ForEach row As DataRow In objDataTable.Rows
           lstNames.Items.Add(row.Item("FirstName") & " " & row.Item("LastName"))
      Next
 
      'Release resources
      objDataTable.Dispose()
      objDataTable = Nothing
 EndSub
 
EndClass

What this example is doing is opening a connection to the Northwind database, selecting the data from the FristName and LastName columns of the Employees table, and filling that data into a data table. I then use a For Each Next loop to iterate through each row in the data table to add the value in the FirstName and LastName column to the listbox.

Cheers!