Is there a non-klunky way to perform special-case formatting with bound data?

Question

I am binding many controls on my form to an object returned from a method call like so:

textBoxMoonBeam.DataBindings.Add(new Binding("Text", pi, "MoonBeam"));

Note: "pi" is the name of an instantiation of the PlatypusInfo class.

...but when I am grabbing a dateTime value, which by definition includes the time appended to the date, but I only want to show the date in the control, I've got to eschew the type of binding above and instead do this:

textBoxDateAztecsFirstSawElvis.Text = pi.DateAztecsFirstSawElvis.ToString("d");

Is there a way to bind my data like the first example, and still truncate the date?

Answer 1

Use the binding source's Format event.

Something like this:

Binding binding = new Binding("Text", pi, "DateAztecsFirstSawElvis", true);
binding.Format += binding_Format;
textBoxDateAztecsFirstSawElvis.DataBindings.Add(binding);

void binding_Format(object sender, ConvertEventArgs e) {
  e.Value = ((DateTime)e.Value).ToShortDateString();
}