LightSwitch - Automatically Upper Case TextBox Text

Here’s a quick post in reference to question on how to automatically upper case the characters whilst typing into a TextBox.

LightSwitch includes a changed event but the problem with using this is that it only fires after leaving the TextBox. You therefore don’t see the characters being upper cased as you type into the control.

One possible workaround is to handle the KeyUp event of the TextBox control. In keeping with the standard practice of handling Silverlight control events, the ControlAvailable event is used to attach the KeyUp event of the Textbox.

Assuming that you have a TextBox named ‘Surname’, here is some sample code that automatically upper cases the characters as you type into the control. The ‘SelectionStart’ property is used to set the cursor location to the end of the TextBox, otherwise you end up with some strange behaviour as subsequent text will be inserted into the start of the TextBox.

 

Private Sub MyScreen_Activated()
    AddHandler Me.FindControl("Surname").ControlAvailable, AddressOf TextBoxAvailable
End Sub

Private Sub TextBoxAvailable(sender As Object, e As ControlAvailableEventArgs)
    AddHandler CType(e.Control, System.Windows.Controls.TextBox).KeyUp, AddressOf TextBoxKeyUp
End Sub

Private Sub TextBoxKeyUp(sender As Object, e As System.Windows.RoutedEventArgs)
    Dim strTextUpper As String = CType(sender, System.Windows.Controls.TextBox).Text.ToUpper
    CType(sender, System.Windows.Controls.TextBox).Text = strTextUpper
    CType(sender, System.Windows.Controls.TextBox).SelectionStart = strTextUpper.Length
End Sub

Here’s the C# version.

 

private void CreateNew_Activated()
{
    this.FindControl("Property1").ControlAvailable += TextBoxAvailable;
}

private void TextBoxAvailable(object sender, ControlAvailableEventArgs e)
{
    ((System.Windows.Controls.TextBox)e.Control).KeyUp += TextBoxKeyUp;
}

private void TextBoxKeyUp(object sender, System.Windows.RoutedEventArgs e)
{
    string strTextUpper = ((System.Windows.Controls.TextBox)sender).Text.ToUpper;
    ((System.Windows.Controls.TextBox)sender).Text = strTextUpper;
    ((System.Windows.Controls.TextBox)sender).SelectionStart = strTextUpper.Length;
}

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