Adding Bound Columns to GridView in ASP.NET

Step 1:

Drag GirdView from Toolbox on your design page.

Step 2:
 
Check out the code of aspx page. It will be something like this

<asp :GridView ID="GridView1″ runat="server">
</asp:GridView>

Step 3:

Now add one bound column, this way

<asp :GridView ID="GridView1″ runat="server" AutoGenerateColumns="false">
<columns>
<asp :BoundField HeaderText="ColumnName" DataField="ColumnName" />
</columns>
</asp:GridView>

Note: Set the AutoGenerateColumns to false.

Note: HeaderText="ColumnName" is the name appearing as column heading in gridview.

Note: DataField="CoumnName" is the name of column returning from the SELECT query result.

Step 4:

You can add one or more bound columns also

<asp :GridView ID="GridView1″ runat="server" AutoGenerateColumns="false">
<columns>
<asp :BoundField HeaderText="ColumnName" DataField="DataColumnName" />
<asp :BoundField HeaderText="ColumnName" DataField="DataColumnName" />
<asp :BoundField HeaderText="ColumnName" DataField="DataColumnName" />
</columns>
</asp:GridView>

Step 5:

Example: Say your code behind class contains -

{
Strinf sql = "SELECT emp_name,emp_id,emp_salary,emp_email FROM .......";
SqlDataAdapter ad = new SqlDataAdapter(sql,connectionObject);
DataSet ds=new DataSet();
ad.Fill(ds);
GridView1.DataSource = ds;
GridView1.DataBind();
}

Now, in some situations you want some additional columns to retrieve for later use.

But, while binding the DataSet to GridView you want to display limited columns.

Here, you retieve columns: emp_name,emp_id,emp_salary and emp_email

But, you dont want to display email in gridview but want to use it in your code behind class somewhere.

So, you need to set the AutoGenerateColumns = false.

Then, you need to bound the columns which you want to bind to gridview.

<asp :GridView ID="GridView1″ runat="server" AutoGenerateColumns="false">
<columns>
<asp :BoundField HeaderText="Employee Name" DataField="emp_name" />
<asp :BoundField HeaderText="Employee Id" DataField="emp_id" />
<asp :BoundField HeaderText="Salary" DataField="emp_salary" />
</columns>
</asp:GridView>

Step 6: Run the application

Result would be:

Employee Name	Employee Id	Salary
Suresh Paldia	3625132	25000
Himanshu Bhardwaj	2564125	25632
Kamal Gupta	4125452	25654

And DataSet still contains emp_email which is not bound to gridview but can be retrieved out of dataset and use

Happy Learning...