Member Avatar for Naters_uk

I am creating a movie system.

I am using a dropdownlist to retrieve the date slots data from the movie database and display it into the dropdown list. Anyone have any idea how to do it with some sample asp.net codes? Thanks :eek:

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Since confirmed the data will come from a database (and following 's question about hard‑coded vs DB), two practical ways to get multiple columns into a DropDownList are shown below: concatenate the fields in SQL and bind them as the DataTextField, or create ListItem objects server‑side so the displayed text is a combination but additional values (date/time/id) are still available.

Example — concatenate in SQL and bind:

SELECT SlotID,
  CONVERT(varchar(10), ShowDate, 103) + ' ' + LEFT(CONVERT(varchar(8), ShowTime, 108),5) AS SlotText
FROM ShowSlots
ORDER BY ShowDate, ShowTime

ASPX and C# bind:

<asp:DropDownList ID="ddlSlots" runat="server" DataTextField="SlotText" DataValueField="SlotID" />

// code-behind
ddlSlots.DataSource = dataTable;
ddlSlots.DataTextField = "SlotText";
ddlSlots.DataValueField = "SlotID";
ddlSlots.DataBind();

Example — keep separate fields and attach them to each option:

while(reader.Read())
{
  var id = reader["SlotID"].ToString();
  var text = Convert.ToDateTime(reader["ShowDate"]).ToString("dd/MM/yyyy")
             + " " + Convert.ToDateTime(reader["ShowTime"]).ToString("HH:mm")
             + " - " + reader["Auditorium"];
  var li = new ListItem(text, id);
  li.Attributes["data-date"] = Convert.ToDateTime(reader["ShowDate"]).ToString("yyyy-MM-dd");
  li.Attributes["data-time"] = Convert.ToDateTime(reader["ShowTime"]).ToString("HH:mm");
  ddlSlots.Items.Add(li);
}

Troubleshooting notes: set DataTextField/DataValueField before calling DataBind; bind only when !IsPostBack to preserve selection; use parameterized queries to avoid SQL injection; for large numbers of slots consider an autocomplete or paging instead of a huge dropdown; store UTC in DB and format server‑side for consistent display.

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Member Avatar for Paladine

Are you meaning hard code the Dropdownlist or retrieve the data from a DB source?

Member Avatar for Naters_uk

Retrieving from Database

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