Fill ListObject controls with data

You can use data binding as a way to quickly add data to your document. After binding data to a list object, you can disconnect the list object so it displays the data but is no longer bound to the data source.

Applies to: The information in this topic applies to document-level projects and VSTO Add-in projects for Excel. For more information, see Features available by Office application and project type.

1. Create a DataTable at the class level.

   • C#
   • VB

   System.Data.DataTable table = new System.Data.DataTable("Employees");
   

2. Add sample columns and data in the Startup event handler of the Sheet1 class (in a document-level project) or ThisAddIn class (in an application-level project).

   • C#
   • VB

   table.Columns.Add("FirstName", typeof(string));
   table.Columns.Add("LastName", typeof(string));
   table.Columns.Add("Title", typeof(string));
   
   table.Rows.Add("Nancy", "Anderson", "Sales Representative");
   table.Rows.Add("Robert", "Brown", "Sales Representative");
   

3. Call the SetDataBinding method and pass in the column names in the order they should appear. The order of the columns in the list object can differ from the order in which they appear in the DataTable.

   • C#
   • VB

   
        list1.AutoSetDataBoundColumnHeaders = true;
        list1.SetDataBinding(table, null, "LastName", "FirstName");
   

1. Call the Disconnect method of List1.

   • C#
   • VB

   list1.Disconnect();
   

This code example assumes you have an existing ListObject named list1 on the worksheet in which this code appears.

• Extend Word documents and Excel workbooks in VSTO Add-ins at run time
• Controls on Office documents
• Add controls to Office documents at run time
• How to: Map ListObject columns to data
• Automate Excel by using extended objects
• ListObject control
• Bind data to controls in Office solutions
• How to: Populate worksheets with data from a database
• How to: Populate documents with data from services