NGWS SDK Documentation  

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Selecting Text Programmatically in the TextBox Control

You can select text programmatically in the Win Forms TextBox control. For example, if you create a function that searches text for a particular string, you can select the text to visually alert the reader of the found string's position.

To select text programmatically

  1. Set the SelectionStart property to the beginning of the text you want to select.

    The SelectionStart property is a number that indicates the insertion point within the string of text, with 0 being the left-most position. If the SelectionStart property is set to a value equal to or greater than the number of characters in the text box, the insertion point is placed after the last character.

  2. Set the SelectionLength property to the length of the text you want to select.

    The SelectionLength property is a numeric value that sets the width of the insertion point. Setting the SelectionLength to a number greater than 0 causes that number of characters to be selected, starting from the current insertion point.

  3. (Optional) Access the selected text through the SelectedText property.

The code below selects the contents of a text box when the control's GotFocus event occurs. The TextBox1_GotFocus event handler must be bound to the control; see Creating Event Handlers at Run Time for Win Forms for more information.

[Visual Basic]
Private Sub TextBox1_GotFocus(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs)
   TextBox1.SelectionStart = 0
   TextBox1.SelectionLength = Len(TextBox1.Text)
End Sub

[C#]

See Also

Controlling the Insertion Point in a TextBox Control | Creating a Password Text Box with the TextBox Control | Creating a Read-Only Text Box | Putting Quotation Marks in a String Programmatically | Viewing Multiple Lines in the TextBox Control| TextBox Control