Navigate to records in RadGrid by typing a letter in a textbox

Requirements
RadGrid for ASP .NET version	Q1 2007 and later
RadControls for ASP .NET AJAX version	2008.1.415 and later
.NET version	2.0 and later
Visual Studio version	2005 and later
Programming language	Javascript
Browser support	all supported by RadGrid for ASP .NET all browsers supported by RadControls for ASP .NET AJAX

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

The current project shows a RadGrid with a textbox in the command item template. Typing a letter in this textbox sets selected row in the grid to be the first found grid row that has a value in a designated column starting with the letter typed. The entire operation is done client-side using RadGrid client-side API.

Grid's ClientSettings-->Selecting-->AllowRowSelect is set to true in order to have MasterTableView's Rows array available. Scrolling is enabled and the grid is scrolled down to the selected row, when set. Scrolling is based on the following help topic:
http://www.telerik.com/help/aspnet/grid/?grdScrollToTheSelectedItem.html.

In addition the column that provides the values which are checked for the starting letter is added to MasterTableView's DataKeyNames and ClientSettings.EnableClientKeyValues is enabled in order these values to be accessible on the client. The essential javascript code follows:

May 15, 2007

Dear Telerik admin --

Here you confirm what we observed, that: "ClientSettings-->Selecting-->AllowRowSelect [must apparently be] set to true in order to have MasterTableView's Rows array available."

A grid for one of our products has a checkbox and other fields in each row and is not row-selectable. Checkboxes are checked to indicate user specifications. We do not use multi-row selection because (1) it requires key-chords or alternate buttons, which our guidelines do not allow, and (2) such a capability would be hidden from users, whereas checkboxes makes the selection capability obvious.

In our opinion, both server-side and client-side interfaces ought to have a simple GetCell(iRow, iColumn), but in fact neither has such a method. On server-side, with the application of undocumented behaviors, we manage to get the checkbox values. On client-side, we have as yet found no workable approach.
 
And so the question: for a grid-that is not row-selectable, how do we get client-side access to a particular cell?

-- Craig Bolon
   Brookline, MA, USA

May 15, 2007

Dear Telerik admin --

We found a solution for this one. Make the grid row-selectable but defeat selections with:

    function GridXXXRowSelected(oRow)
    {
        var oGrid = <% = ofGridXXX.ClientID %>;
        if (oGrid != null)
            oTable = oGrid.MasterTableView;
        if (oTable != null)
            oTable.DeselectRow(oRow.Control, true);
        return false;
    }

Now one has Rows[] available for GetCellByColumnUniqueName().

-- Craig Bolon
   Brookline, MA, USA

Hi. The rows are referenced initially, i.e. on page load. But when I click on Add New Row and add a new row dynamically in-place, my javascript code is not able to find the new row. How do i loop through all the old and new rows of a grid at client side?

Hello,

Indeed, the client object of the control is only available when the client-side row selection has been enabled.
Indeed, one option is to deselect the row. Also, you can just cancel each row selection, before it is being carried out, thus not having to call the deselect function.
Further, you can iterate through all the items on the client via the RadGridClientObject.MasterTableView.Items object.
I hope this helps.

Best wishes,
Yavor
the Telerik team

Hi,

I have attached an update of the code library entry, to the latest Prometheus version of the control.

Kind regards,
Yavor
the Telerik team