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Read Only Ranges

The following article explains how to use read only ranges in RadRichTextBox

What is a Read Only range?

Read only ranges are a convenient way to restrict some of the content of a particular document from editing. When content is in a read only range, users are unable to edit, format or delete it. What is more, manipulating the document from code with RadRichTextBox's API or commands is also not possible. Additionally, the predefined UI - RadRichTextBoxRibbonUI corresponds to the state of the document when the caret is located in a read only region by fading out the parts which operate with the document content in order to notify users they cannot edit this content.

RadRichTextBox also provides another, more advanced option for restricting content which allows particular users or groups of users to edit different parts of a document. For more information on this check the documentation of the Document Protection feature.

A read only annotation range is represented in RadDocument's structure by two paired annotation markers – a ReadOnlyRangeStart instance and a ReadOnlyRangeEnd instance. Both are inline elements, thus users are able to edit the document prior and after the annotation markers. More on Annotations you can find here.

As read only ranges do not have a proper equivalent in most of the supported export formats (like DOCX or HTML), they are only exported to RadDocument's native format – XAML.

Insert Read Only Range

RadDocument has two states - measured and non-measured. Depending on the state of the document you can insert a read only range in one of the following ways.

Insert in Measured Document

When the document is measured (for example, shown in a RadRichTextBox), you can select the part of the document which you want to make read-only and use the InsertReadOnly() method of RadRichTextBox or RadDocumentEditor respectively:

this.radRichTextBox.InsertReadOnlyRange(); 
Me.radRichTextBox.InsertReadOnlyRange() 

Generally, editing the content of a read only range is not possible through the UI and through RadRichtextBox's API. However, when manipulating a document using RadDocumentEditor you can set the RespectReadOnlyRanges property of RadDocumentEditor to false and read only ranges will be ignored.

Insert in Non-measured Document

As opposed to when inserting with one of the methods of RadRichTextBox, when building a document from code you have to make sure that the annotations in it are explicitly paired. This can be achieved with the PairWithStart() method of AnnotationRangeEnd. Here is an example which builds a RadDocument with a read only range in it.

RadDocument document = new RadDocument(); 
Section section = new Section(); 
Paragraph paragraph = new Paragraph(); 
Span span = new Span("Content prior range["); 
Span span2 = new Span("]Content after range"); 
Span readOnlyContent = new Span("READ ONLY"); 
 
ReadOnlyRangeStart rangeStart = new ReadOnlyRangeStart(); 
ReadOnlyRangeEnd rangeEnd = new ReadOnlyRangeEnd(); 
rangeEnd.PairWithStart(rangeStart); 
 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(span); 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(rangeStart); 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(readOnlyContent); 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(rangeEnd); 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(span2); 
 
section.Blocks.Add(paragraph); 
document.Sections.Add(section); 
Dim document As New RadDocument() 
Dim section As New Section() 
Dim paragraph As New Paragraph() 
Dim span As New Span("Content prior range[") 
Dim span2 As New Span("]Content after range") 
Dim readOnlyContent As New Span("READ ONLY") 
 
Dim rangeStart As New ReadOnlyRangeStart() 
Dim rangeEnd As New ReadOnlyRangeEnd() 
rangeEnd.PairWithStart(rangeStart) 
 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(span) 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(rangeStart) 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(readOnlyContent) 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(rangeEnd) 
paragraph.Inlines.Add(span2) 
 
section.Blocks.Add(paragraph) 
document.Sections.Add(section) 

Delete Read Only Range

In order to remove a read only range, you should simply call the DeleteReadOnlyRange() method of RadRichTextBox or RadDocumentEditor:

this.radRichTextBox.DeleteReadOnlyRange(); 
Me.radRichTextBox.DeleteReadOnlyRange() 

The above-demonstrated method will delete the read only range the caret is currently located in and make the content which was in it editable again.

Additionally, if you can obtain a reference to a particular ReadOnlyRangeStart element in the document, you can delete it with the DeleteReadOnlyRange(ReadOnlyRangeStart start) method. For example, if you want to delete a particular range based on its Tag, you can do it as follows:

ReadOnlyRangeStart start = this.radRichTextBox.Document.EnumerateChildrenOfType<ReadOnlyRangeStart>().Where(x => x.Tag == "ReadOnly").FirstOrDefault(); 
if (start != null) 
{ 
    this.radRichTextBox.DeleteReadOnlyRange(start); 
} 
Dim start As ReadOnlyRangeStart = Me.radRichTextBox.Document.EnumerateChildrenOfType(Of ReadOnlyRangeStart)().Where(Function(x) x.Tag = "ReadOnly").FirstOrDefault() 
If start IsNot Nothing Then 
    Me.radRichTextBox.DeleteReadOnlyRange(start) 
End If 

See Also

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