string.join/properties.select by display name instead of variable name

Question

I'm using the following code to export a table to csv using Entity Framework and MVC:

string header = string.Join("\t", properties.Select(p => p.Name).ToArray());

Is there any way to select the display name I set in my model for example displaying "Hours" instead of "hrs":

    [Display(Name = "Hours")]
    public float hrs { get; set;

Currently I just get all the variable names and not the diaplay names I set. It seems like there should be an easy fix to this, but google isn't being much help.

Are you attempting to do this via reflection? If so, check out the answer to this question: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6637679/reflection-get-attribute-name-and-value-on-property — James Wilson, Jul 26 '13 at 20:16

score 0 · Answer 1 · edited May 23 '17 at 10:25

If you want to get an attribute from a Property (such as hrs) use the below method

    public static string GetDisplayName(Type type, string prpName)
    {
        PropertyInfo[] props = type.GetProperties();
        foreach (PropertyInfo prop in props)
        {
            if(!prop.Name.Equals(prpName))
            {
                continue;
            }

            object[] attrs = prop.GetCustomAttributes(true);
            foreach (object attr in attrs)
            {
                if (attr is Display)
                {
                    Display dAttr = (Display)attr;
                    return dAttr.Name;
                }
            }
        }

        return null;
    }

If you want to get it for all of them, you should produce a list and work off that.

I would suggest something like this:

    public static string[] GetDisplayNames(Type type)
    {
        PropertyInfo[] props = type.GetProperties();
        string[] dNames = new string[props.Length];
        for (int i = 0; i < dNames.Length; i++)
        {
            PropertyInfo prop = props[i];
            object[] attrs = prop.GetCustomAttributes(true);
            foreach (object attr in attrs)
            {
                if (attr is Display)
                {
                    Display dAttr = (Display)attr;
                    dNames[i] = dAttr.Name;
                    break;
                }
            }

            if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(dNames[i]))
            {
                dNames[i] = prop.Name;
            }
        }

        return dNames;
    }

See:

string.join/properties.select by display name instead of variable name

1 Answers1