Using Null in DateTimePickers

[John Smith]

Hey folks,

I have a DateTimePicker control on my Windows Form. Whenever I either:
a) Don't give it a value
b) Set it's value to Null
c) Set it's value to ""
It makes the date today's date.

I need it to be empty though. How do I make it empty? It represents a
field in my database which legitimately can be null and so I can't show it
as todays date.

Thanks a lot for the help!



(I posted a similar message a couple of days ago without a response, but
it's really important and time is of the essence so I'm trying again)

 

[Nicholas Paldino [.NET/C# MVP]]

John,

Unfortunately, the DateTimePicker doesn't support this. The best way to
do this is to have a checkbox to indicate whether or not it has a value.

Hope this helps.

 

[Tom Porterfield]

Hey folks,

I have a DateTimePicker control on my Windows Form. Whenever I either:
a) Don't give it a value
b) Set it's value to Null
c) Set it's value to ""
It makes the date today's date.

I need it to be empty though. How do I make it empty? It represents a
field in my database which legitimately can be null and so I can't show it
as todays date.

Thanks a lot for the help!

As Nicholas states, the DateTimePicker from MS does not support null.
There are third party controls that do. Infragistics
(www.infragistics.com) NetAdvantage Suite includes a calendar control
that supports null.

 

[Ignacio Machin \( .NET/ C# MVP \)]

Hi Jon,


I want to add an approach that I used once in a web app, as DateTime does
not support null you need to define a null value inside its range, I
selected a date that was not possible in my domain ( I think you could also
use DateTime.MinDate ), so what I do is assign it as the selectedDate, but I
set the visible Date to today, therefore the controls is happy cause it has
a value and as this value is way outside the domain it will never be
displayed.

Maybe this does not solve your problem 100% but it may give you other
ideas.

Cheers,

 

[John Smith]

Thanks...the problem is though that if it's displaying today's date...the
user may think that is what is in the database and take action based upon
that.

 

[John Smith]

Thanks everyone....But how incredibly depressing

 

[Ignacio Machin \( .NET/ C# MVP \)]

Hi,

What you can do is make clear than a date has not being selected, just
create a new control with a datetimepicker and a label, the label may
display some text for the user.

Cheers,