CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c#winformsvisual-studio
Char
Char

Reputation: 41

Create a Picture Box and Labels for each object in a list, in Visual C#

I'm creating a program that does a search for music albums from a fixed source, and returns a list of results as a JSON. I've successfully learnt to deserialise this object so it's usable in C#, but there's one thing I'm struggling with.

At the moment, I've manually created several picture boxes (for album art) and labels (for info.) for results, however the number of results is bound to vary depending on the users search.

Is there a way to perhaps do a 'for each' loop that goes through each of the results, and can programmatically create the necessary picture box and label combos, in order to cater for fewer or more results?

I ask because I've seen applications perform a search and surely all of the results cannot just be filling preset labels/text boxes? 

for each result in results:
{
    Create Picture Box;
    Create Labels;
}

Upvotes: 2

Views: 1305

Answers (1)

Ian
Ian

Reputation: 30813

Yes, you could to that. Assuming that your code is in a WinForm Form, use PictureBox, Label, and Controls.Add:

foreach (var result in results){
    PictureBox pb = ...;
    //initialize your PictureBox
    pb.Location = ...;
    pb.Image = ...;
    pb.Name = ...;
    // etc, then add
    Controls.Add(pb);

    //similarly for Label
    Label lbl = ...;
    //initialize your Label
    lbl.Location = ...;
    lbl.Text = ...;
    lbl.Name = ...;
    // etc, then add
    Controls.Add(lbl);
}

One part you need to be careful in the dynamic creation is the Location. Make sure that the new controls' locations are not overlapped. If not, they may look like single control, because multiple controls are placed on top of one another.

Note: to do it more systematically, either putting the PictureBox and Label in a FlowLayoutPanel, and/or creating UserControl with a PictureBox and a Label on it would be a great idea. Then we only need to add the UserControl one by one, either directly to the Form or to the FlowLayoutPanel (please read the comments below this answer). My answer is a simplistic approach though, just to point out the idea that: yes, it is possibile to create dynamic controls in C# WinForm.

Upvotes: 1

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