Merge Columns in Datagrid

[Vipul Bhatt]

Hi Clay.Another one here.
Can I merge two columns in datagrid.
Thanx a lot.

[Clay Burch]

It is fairly straight-forwward to make a cell blank if it has the same value as another one, but you still see the gridlines. Trying to do away with the gridlines would be difficult in a datagrid. Syncfusion's Essential Grid does allow youto cover cells so several cells behaves like a single cell.

To make a DataGrid cell blank if it is the same as the one above it, you could derived a custom columnstyle and not draw the text if the value is the same as the cell above it. Here is a C# snippet that shows the Paint override that you could use. You can see how to derive a custom column style in the FAQ referenced below.

public class DataGridTextMergeColumn : DataGridTextBoxColumn
{
protected override void Paint(System.Drawing.Graphics g, System.Drawing.Rectangle bounds, System.Windows.Forms.CurrencyManager source, int rowNum, System.Drawing.Brush backBrush, System.Drawing.Brush foreBrush, bool alignToRight)
{
if(rowNum > 0 && this.GetColumnValueAtRow(source, rowNum) == this.GetColumnValueAtRow(source, rowNum - 1 ))
{
g.FillRectangle(backBrush, bounds);
return;
}
base.Paint(g, bounds, source, rowNum, backBrush, foreBrush, alignToRight);
}
}

George Shepherd's Windows Forms FAQ contains an entry entitled:

How can I restrict the keystrokes that will be accepted in a column of my datagrid?

Check it out at:
http://www.syncfusion.com/faq/winforms/search/755.asp