How can I sort a WinForms DataGridView on a CheckBox column?

Question

So I had a DataGridView with autogenerated columns, some of which were checkbox columns. When I clicked on the check box column's header, it didn't sort. I researched it and it turns out that Microsoft didn't include automatic sorting for checkbox columns... Which I think is absurd--how hard is it to sort checked / not checked?

How can you get a DataGridView to sort check box columns for you?

Here's what I came up with:

Answer 1

First you need to hook into two events, the column added event and the column header click event:

AddHandler dg.ColumnAdded, AddressOf dgColumnAdded
AddHandler dg.ColumnHeaderMouseClick, AddressOf dgSortColumns

Then, enable programmatic sorting for each check box column:

Private Sub dgColumnAdded(ByVal sender As Object, _
ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.DataGridViewColumnEventArgs)
    If e.Column.GetType Is GetType(DataGridViewCheckBoxColumn) Then
        e.Column.SortMode = DataGridViewColumnSortMode.Programmatic
    End If
End Sub

Then, create a handler that will sort a checkbox column, but do nothing for columns that will handle their own sorting:

Private Sub dgSortColumns(ByVal sender As Object, _
ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.DataGridViewCellMouseEventArgs)
    Dim dg As DataGridView = sender
    Dim c As DataGridViewColumn = dg.Columns(e.ColumnIndex)
    If c.SortMode = DataGridViewColumnSortMode.Programmatic Then
        If dg.SortedColumn IsNot Nothing _
        AndAlso dg.SortedColumn.Name <> c.Name Then
            dg.Sort(c, System.ComponentModel.ListSortDirection.Ascending)
        Else
            Select Case dg.SortOrder
                Case Windows.Forms.SortOrder.None
                    dg.Sort(c, System.ComponentModel.ListSortDirection.Ascending)
                Case Windows.Forms.SortOrder.Ascending
                    dg.Sort(c, System.ComponentModel.ListSortDirection.Descending)
                Case Windows.Forms.SortOrder.Descending
                    dg.Sort(c, System.ComponentModel.ListSortDirection.Ascending)
            End Select
        End If
    End If
End Sub

And there you go! Now was it really that hard, Microsoft? ;-)

Answer 2

You could also simply do this:

DataGridView.Columns("ColumnOfChoice").SortMode = DataGridViewColumnSortMode.Automatic

Works in vb.net 4.0

Answer 3

You only need to add next lines to the code of the form (tested in VB.NET 2013)

Private Sub DataGridView1_ColumnAdded(sender As Object, e As System.Windows.Forms.DataGridViewColumnEventArgs) Handles DataGridView1.ColumnAdded
    If e.Column.GetType Is GetType(DataGridViewCheckBoxColumn) Then
        e.Column.SortMode = DataGridViewColumnSortMode.Automatic
    End If
End Sub

Answer 4

I'm not sure about VB, but for C# in VS2012 in the designer you can also set the SortMode.

Right-click on the DataGridView and go to "Edit Columns".

There's a drop-down for SortMode with a choice of NotSortable, Automatic, and Programmatic.

It appears that the default for most columns is Automatic, but for checkboxes (boolean) columns the default is NotSortable.

Answer 5

I have created an extension method that you can reuse, you just need to use it during the form load event.

------ Be sure that your DataSource is sortable. ------

If you are binding the DataGridView to a simple List it WONT WORK, you need to use something else, I recommend you to use this SortableBindingList; You can pass directly your original List IEnumerable to the SortableBindingList's constructor.

Load:

private void frmWithTheDataGrid_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    this.yourDataGridView.SortabilizeMe();
}

Then add this into a static class to use it as an ExtensionMethod..

public static void SortabilizeMe(this DataGridView dgv)
{
    dgv.ColumnAdded+= delegate(object sender, DataGridViewColumnEventArgs args)
    {
        args.Column.SortMode = DataGridViewColumnSortMode.Programmatic;
    };

    dgv.ColumnHeaderMouseClick += delegate(object sender, DataGridViewCellMouseEventArgs args)
    {
        var col = dgv.Columns[args.ColumnIndex];

        if (dgv.SortedColumn != null && dgv.SortedColumn.Name != col.Name)
        {
            dgv.Sort(row, ListSortDirection.Ascending);
        }
        else
        {
            switch (dgv.SortOrder)
            {
                case SortOrder.None:
                    dgv.Sort(col, ListSortDirection.Ascending);
                    break;
                case SortOrder.Ascending:
                    dgv.Sort(col, ListSortDirection.Descending);
                    break;
                case SortOrder.Descending:
                    dgv.Sort(col, ListSortDirection.Ascending);
                    break;
            }
        }
    };
}

Then magic will happen :)