why won't this MeasureString work?

[Guest]

I am trying to make a method that will autosize columns to fit the longest
text contained in a DataGrid.

My plan was to take the width of an arbitrary character (underscore, in this
case) and multiply this width to the longest # of characters found for each
column.

But it comes out wrong... I find the longest string no problem, but when I
multiply it by the width that I measured for a single character, it comes out
too big... the columns in the datagrid then get stretched out too wide,
instead of just snug like I wanted. What gives?

Font font = datagrid.Font;
float fontWidth = g.MeasureString("_", font).Width;

// find longest strings in each of datagrid's columns
....

// change column style's width to product of longest string length and font
width
styles[x].Width = (int)(max_widths[x] * fontWidth);

 

[Guest]

You cannot use the width of an arbitrary character becasue you don't have
fixed width characters. If you use a fixed width font, then your solution
will work, but with most of the fonts the letters are varying widths and so
you will not have a true length unless you sum the width of each character.

 

[Guest]

Err, sorry when I editted the post I must have deleted all mention of the
fact I use a monospace font- namely Courier New. Otherwise I wouldn't have
even tried it this way.

Using Courier New, I did a test and found it was getting the same font width
regardless of the character (like lowercase 'L' same width as underscore '_')
but this number seems to be too wide, because when I multiply this number by
the number of characters and apply it to my DataGrid, the columns end up too
wide

You cannot use the width of an arbitrary character becasue you don't have
fixed width characters. If you use a fixed width font, then your solution
will work, but with most of the fonts the letters are varying widths and so
you will not have a true length unless you sum the width of each character.

I am trying to make a method that will autosize columns to fit the longest
text contained in a DataGrid.

My plan was to take the width of an arbitrary character (underscore, in this
case) and multiply this width to the longest # of characters found for each
column.

But it comes out wrong... I find the longest string no problem, but when I
multiply it by the width that I measured for a single character, it comes out
too big... the columns in the datagrid then get stretched out too wide,
instead of just snug like I wanted. What gives?

Font font = datagrid.Font;
float fontWidth = g.MeasureString("_", font).Width;

// find longest strings in each of datagrid's columns
...

// change column style's width to product of longest string length and font
width
styles[x].Width = (int)(max_widths[x] * fontWidth);

 

[Doug Forster]

Hi,

Read this:
http://windowsforms.net/articles/gdiptext.aspx

Cheers
Doug Forster

Err, sorry when I editted the post I must have deleted all mention of the
fact I use a monospace font- namely Courier New. Otherwise I wouldn't have
even tried it this way.

Using Courier New, I did a test and found it was getting the same font
width
regardless of the character (like lowercase 'L' same width as underscore
'_')
but this number seems to be too wide, because when I multiply this number
by
the number of characters and apply it to my DataGrid, the columns end up
too
wide

You cannot use the width of an arbitrary character becasue you don't have
fixed width characters. If you use a fixed width font, then your
solution
will work, but with most of the fonts the letters are varying widths and
so
you will not have a true length unless you sum the width of each
character.

I am trying to make a method that will autosize columns to fit the
longest
text contained in a DataGrid.

My plan was to take the width of an arbitrary character (underscore, in
this
case) and multiply this width to the longest # of characters found for
each
column.

But it comes out wrong... I find the longest string no problem, but
when I
multiply it by the width that I measured for a single character, it
comes out
too big... the columns in the datagrid then get stretched out too
wide,
instead of just snug like I wanted. What gives?

Font font = datagrid.Font;
float fontWidth = g.MeasureString("_", font).Width;

// find longest strings in each of datagrid's columns
...

// change column style's width to product of longest string length and
font
width
styles[x].Width = (int)(max_widths[x] * fontWidth);

 

[Guest]

You can find a lot of help by going to
http://www.syncfusion.com/FAQ/WinForms/default.asp#44

This might get you what you are looking for.

Cheers!

Rob

 

[Christoph Nahr]

I don't know for sure but MeasureString might do some padding to the
left and right of a string. Try creating a string of max_widths[x]
underscores, then measure that string.

How to create a string of duplicate characters:
string s = new string('_', max_widths);

If that's a little bit too small, remember that you may need to round
up the float result of MeasureString (Size.Ceiling or Math.Ceiling).