Fill DataGridViewComboBoxColumn from a DataTable and an enum

Question

I'm trying to fill a DataGridView with values from a DataTable. One of the Columns in the DataGridView should list a ComboBox where the user can select different values from an enum. The initial value should be read from the DataTable

The code:

 enum MyEnum {I1 =  1, I2 = 2,  I3 = 3}

DataTable table = new DataTable();
        table.Columns.Add("ID", typeof(int));
        table.Columns.Add("List", typeof(MyEnum));

        //fill table
        for(int i = 0; i < 10; i++) 
        {
            var row = table.NewRow();
            table.Rows.Add(row);

            row["ID"] = i;
            row["List"] = MyEnum.I2;
        }

        //build DataGridView and fill it with DataTable
        dataGridView1.AutoGenerateColumns = false;

        //Column1
        dataGridView1.Columns.Add(new DataGridViewTextBoxColumn() { Name = "ID", DataPropertyName = "ID" });

        //Column2
        DataGridViewComboBoxColumn col = new DataGridViewComboBoxColumn();
        col.Name = "My Enum Column";
        col.DataSource = Enum.GetValues(typeof(MyEnum));
        col.ValueType = typeof(MyEnum);
        col.DataPropertyName = "List";
        dataGridView1.Columns.Add(col);


        dataGridView1.DataSource = table;

When executing the code, I get the following error: System.FormatException: Invalid DataGridViewComboBoxCell-Value

The error occurs as soon as I set col.DataPropertyName. So the question is, how do I bind the DataGridViewComboBoxColumn to a DataTable where one Column is filled with values from an enum and through the ComboBox DropDown I can select all values valid for the enum?

thanks for your help

Answer 1

The solution is to bind the DataGridViewComboBoxColumn.DataSource to a DataTable that has two columns, Display and Value and set the column's DisplayMember and ValueMember properties to the DataTable column names.

See the accepted answer for: DataGridView linked to DataTable with Combobox column based on enum