ListControl.ValueMember Property

Definition

Gets or sets the path of the property to use as the actual value for the items in the ListControl.

C#
public string ValueMember { get; set; }

Property Value

A String representing a single property name of the DataSource property value, or a hierarchy of period-delimited property names that resolves to a property name of the final data-bound object. The default is an empty string ("").

Exceptions

The specified property path cannot be resolved through the object specified by the DataSource property.

Examples

The following code example shows loading the data into an ArrayList and setting the ValueMember to a property of the object in the list.

C#
using System;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using System.Drawing;
using System.Collections;

namespace MyListControlSample
{
    public class ListBoxSample3 : Form
    {
        private ListBox ListBox1 = new ListBox();
        private Label label1 = new Label();
        private TextBox textBox1 = new TextBox();

        [STAThread]
        static void Main()
        {
            Application.Run(new ListBoxSample3());
        }

        public ListBoxSample3()
        {
            this.ClientSize = new Size(307, 206);
            this.Text = "ListBox Sample3";

            ListBox1.Location = new Point(54, 16);
            ListBox1.Name = "ListBox1";
            ListBox1.Size = new Size(240, 130);

            label1.Location = new Point(14, 150);
            label1.Name = "label1";
            label1.Size = new Size(40, 24);
            label1.Text = "Value";

            textBox1.Location = new Point(54, 150);
            textBox1.Name = "textBox1";
            textBox1.Size = new Size(240, 24);
            
            this.Controls.AddRange(new Control[] { ListBox1, label1, textBox1 });

            // Populate the list box using an array as DataSource.
            ArrayList USStates = new ArrayList();
            USStates.Add(new USState("Alabama", "AL"));
            USStates.Add(new USState("Washington", "WA"));
            USStates.Add(new USState("West Virginia", "WV"));
            USStates.Add(new USState("Wisconsin", "WI"));
            USStates.Add(new USState("Wyoming", "WY"));
            ListBox1.DataSource = USStates;

            // Set the long name as the property to be displayed and the short
            // name as the value to be returned when a row is selected.  Here
            // these are properties; if we were binding to a database table or
            // query these could be column names.
            ListBox1.DisplayMember = "LongName";
            ListBox1.ValueMember = "ShortName";

            // Bind the SelectedValueChanged event to our handler for it.
            ListBox1.SelectedValueChanged += 
                new EventHandler(ListBox1_SelectedValueChanged);

            // Ensure the form opens with no rows selected.
            ListBox1.ClearSelected();
        }

        private void InitializeComponent()
        {
        }

        private void ListBox1_SelectedValueChanged(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {
            if (ListBox1.SelectedIndex != -1)
            {
                textBox1.Text = ListBox1.SelectedValue.ToString();
                // If we also wanted to get the displayed text we could use
                // the SelectedItem item property:
                // string s = ((USState)ListBox1.SelectedItem).LongName;
            }
        }
    }

    public class USState
    {
        private string myShortName;
        private string myLongName;

        public USState(string strLongName, string strShortName)
        {

            this.myShortName = strShortName;
            this.myLongName = strLongName;
        }

        public string ShortName
        {
            get
            {
                return myShortName;
            }
        }

        public string LongName
        {

            get
            {
                return myLongName;
            }
        }
    }
}

Remarks

Specify the contents of the ValueMember property in cases where you bind data.

You can clear the ValueMember property by setting the property to an empty string ("") or null.

Setting a new ValueMember property raises the ValueMemberChanged and SelectedValueChanged events.

Applies to

Product Versions
.NET Framework 1.1, 2.0, 3.0, 3.5, 4.0, 4.5, 4.5.1, 4.5.2, 4.6, 4.6.1, 4.6.2, 4.7, 4.7.1, 4.7.2, 4.8, 4.8.1
Windows Desktop 3.0, 3.1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10