Save control´s caption in a txt file

[marcelosoy1]

hey there,

i´m trying to create some kind of function to save all the labels and buttons caption of all forms of my proyect to a txt file.
I´ve tried taking one by one to this file but the fact is that they are too much and it would be a really long proccess to do it that way so i´m looking for some way to do it automatically

the structure of the file would be:

Name of the form - name of the control - caption

i need this because i´m creating a program that has to be in more than 1 language and so the idea would be to have this in file and select the right captions when i select them through a button

I hope somebody can help me with this,

thanks

[Grimfort]

Or you could use a resource file which is designed for this scenario, simple example here.

[marcelosoy1]

Man i checked the localizable thing but it is the same as taking all the captions to a file by myself

i need something else to do it

[amrita]

Try something like

For each ctrl as Control in MyForm
   ' Check if its a label \ button (control gettype)
   ' Write to a file
Next

Do this for all forms

[SJWhiteley]

If you don't want to use the built-in localization mechanisms, then you are going to have to do it manually (which recreates the built-in functionality).

Essentially, you will need to call a method for every control with a caption and set the caption according to a locale. each time you change the locale, you will read the appropriate file.

[marcelosoy1]

hey guys i´ve been working on it and i´ve found something that seems to work but not al all i don´t know why maybe you can help me to correct it

(using the code gave by amrita i came to this)

i have a button with click event with this:

( i have a form called clients)

For Each ctrl As Control In clients.Controls

            Dim ctrlname As String = ctrl.Name
            Dim ctrltext As String = ctrl.Text
            Dim text As String

            If ctrl.GetType Is GetType(TextBox) Then

                text = "clients" & "." & ctrl.Name & "." & "text" & "=" & ctrl.Text
                Const fic As String = "C:\translations.txt"
                Dim sw As New System.IO.StreamWriter(fic, True)
                sw.WriteLine(text)
                sw.Close()

            Else

                If ctrl.GetType Is GetType(Label) Then

            text = "clients" & "." & ctrl.Name & "." & "text" & "=" & ctrl.Text

                    Const fic As String = "C:\translations.txt"
                    Dim sw As New System.IO.StreamWriter(fic, True)
                    sw.WriteLine(text)
                    sw.Close()

                End If

            End If

        Next ctrl

When I use this code the program save just 1 control in it but in the way i want it so in some point it works.
but there must be some problem with the for because it doesn´t go to the next control

anybody can help me with this

[minitech]

Here's 2 functions:

Public Sub SaveToFile(ByVal f As Form, ByVal location As String)
     Dim sw As New IO.StreamWriter(location)
     Dim s As New Stack(Of Control)
     s.Push(f)
     While s.Count > 0
          Dim pc As Control = s.Pop()
          For Each c As Control In pc.Controls
               sw.WriteLine(GetPath(f, c) & "=" & c.Text)
               s.Push(c)
          Next
     End While
     sw.Close()
     sw.Dispose()
End Sub

Public Sub RestoreFromFile(ByVal f As Form, ByVal location As String)
     Dim sr As New IO.StreamReader(location)
     Do
          Dim s As String = sr.ReadLine()
          If s = "" Then Exit Do
          GetControl(f, s.Substring(0, s.IndexOf("="c))).Text = s.Substring(s.IndexOf("="c) + 1)
     Loop
     sr.Close()
     sr.Dispose()
End Sub

Private Function GetControl(ByVal c As Control, ByVal path As String) As Control
     Dim i As Integer = path.IndexOf("."c)
     If i = -1 Then Return c.Controls(path)
     Dim s As String = path.Substring(0, i)
     Return GetControl(c.Controls(path), path.Substring(i + 1))
End Function

Private Function GetPath(ByVal f As Form, ByVal c As Control) As String
     Dim s As String = c.Name
     While c.Parent IsNot f AndAlso c.Parent IsNot Nothing
          c = c.Parent
          s = c.Name & "." & s
     End While
     Return s
End Function

To use them in your form:

'To save
SaveToFile(Me, "data.dat")
'To load
RestoreFromFile(Me, "data.dat")

[marcelosoy1]

let me check it out

[marcelosoy1]

Here's 2 functions:

Public Sub SaveToFile(ByVal f As Form, ByVal location As String)
     Dim sw As New IO.StreamWriter(location)
     Dim s As New Stack(Of Control)
     s.Push(f)
     While s.Count > 0
          Dim pc As Control = s.Pop()
          For Each c As Control In pc.Controls
               sw.WriteLine(GetPath(f, c) & "=" & c.Text)
               s.Push(c)
          Next
     End While
     sw.Close()
     sw.Dispose()
End Sub

Public Sub RestoreFromFile(ByVal f As Form, ByVal location As String)
     Dim sr As New IO.StreamReader(location)
     Do
          Dim s As String = sr.ReadLine()
          If s = "" Then Exit Do
          GetControl(f, s.Substring(0, s.IndexOf("="c)).Text = s.Substring(s.IndexOf("="c) + 1)
     Loop
     sr.Close()
     sr.Dispose()
End Sub

Private Function GetControl(ByVal c As Control, ByVal path As String) As Control
     Dim i As Integer = path.IndexOf("."c)
     If i = -1 Then Return c.Controls(path)
     Dim s As String = path.Substring(0, i)
     Return GetControl(c.Controls(path), path.Substring(i + 1))
End Function

Private Function GetPath(ByVal f As Form, ByVal c As Control) As String
     Dim s As String = c.Name
     While c.Parent IsNot f AndAlso c.Parent IsNot Nothing
          c = c.Parent
          s = c.Name & "." & s
     End While
     Return s
End Function

To use them in your form:

'To save
SaveToFile(Me, "data.dat")
'To load
RestoreFromFile(Me, "data.dat")

man i tried to use your code but

but there is an error onthis line :

GetControl(f, s.Substring(0, s.IndexOf("="c)).Text = s.Substring(s.IndexOf("="c) + 1)

there is an extra parentheses an also the .text is not a property of that

[minitech]

Sorry, I forgot a parenthesis. It should be:

GetControl(f, s.Substring(0, s.IndexOf("="c))).Text = s.Substring(s.IndexOf("="c) + 1)

[marcelosoy1]

Sorry, I forgot a parenthesis. It should be:

GetControl(f, s.Substring(0, s.IndexOf("="c))).Text = s.Substring(s.IndexOf("="c) + 1)

sorry for my ignorance but how should i use your code

cause if it is just using the save to file and restore from file

the result is a file with this text on it : Button1 = Button1

[minitech]

Isn't that right, though? Button1's text is Button1 if you just added it to the form and did nothing to it...

I already told you how to use my code:

To use them in your form:

'To save
SaveToFile(Me, "data.dat")
'To load
RestoreFromFile(Me, "data.dat")

[marcelosoy1]

Isn't that right, though? Button1's text is Button1 if you just added it to the form and did nothing to it...

I already told you how to use my code:

ok the thing is that the way i need it is this..

for example the control is a textxbox, its name is btnexit and its text is exit

i would like the functions to save the control to the file in this way

btnexit.text = exit

the same way you write it as code to change a button text so i can have it several times to change the text to another language

anyway thanks for your attention man thanks a lot

[minitech]

Oh, okay, I see what you're saying here - you want it to generate code instead?

The way I designed it is so that you can save and load from your application, not to generate code. Does it really make a difference?

If it does, just add and remove .Text in the methods:

GetControl(f, s.Substring(0, s.IndexOf("="c)).Remove(s.IndexOf("="c)-5,5)).Text = s.Substring(s.IndexOf("="c) + 1)

and

sw.WriteLine(GetPath(f, c) & ".Text" "=" & c.Text)

[marcelosoy1]

ok your are getting close that is the way i need the file to be saved but it not the idea yet. sorry if this is getting annoying

what i need is a function that recongizes all the controls in a form (textboxes, labels and buttons)

and save them in the file we were talking about in that format do you understand ??

[minitech]

Yes, and the code I posted does exactly that.

[marcelosoy1]

ohh ok now it works right i was running it the wrong place.

this is the last thing i ask you you´ve been really kind with me

can you change the function to do that but with all the forms in a project at the same time

i promise it will be the last thing i ask you

hehe thanks man for all this

[minitech]

Unfortunately, I can't - I don't know the names of the forms in your projects. It's possible to loop through all the open forms, but that seems like a bad solution. Is it really so hard to do them all separately?

[Grimfort]

The code must be in a running form, so you have to create an instance of every form in your project and run this method against it.

[minitech]

Or use the default instance :P Although I hate the default instance, it seems to be what you're using.

[marcelosoy1]

Unfortunately, I can't - I don't know the names of the forms in your projects. It's possible to loop through all the open forms, but that seems like a bad solution. Is it really so hard to do them all separately?

the problem is that there are like 6 forms right now and i think i´m gonna add a lot more and every form is have a lot of controls and it is really long to do it that way

i can give you the name of the forms right now:

clients
report
login
menu
services
employees

do just one and then i copy it using the other forms names ok?

thanks

[Grimfort]

If you only have 6 forms I'm telling you good advise, use the built-in localisation method I gave at the start. I have apps with over 100 forms and believe me, laods of them have custom controls that do not just have a .Text property. Also have tab captions, tooltips, menuitems, print controls, filenames.

In your loop above mini, does it check for children of children, I couldn't see that it did.

[minitech]

SaveToFile(clients, "clients.dat") 'Uses default instance :P
'or, to load
RestoreFromFile(clients, "clients.dat")

EDIT:
@Grimfort: Yes it does, look at the Stack(Of Control) loop.

Every control has a .Text property that can be hidden, but not removed. It'll usually contain either nothing or the name of the control and a number. To save some code and time, I just save every control. It's OK on efficiency. And it is much better to use built-in localization, but for some reason the OP just doesn't want to.

[Grimfort]

I was just about to edit my post when I saw it, I've not used that method before, might be useful on a treeview as well with massive number of layers. Nice one.

[minitech]

It took me a while to figure it out even though it's so simple

[marcelosoy1]

so then the best way to do it is to use the localizable attribute in the forms.

I´ve read the link about that but i don´t understand how it works

any idea?

[minitech]

No, it has little to do with the Localizable attribute because that's set for you. Basically, write out all your forms in the language used most. Then, go into your project properties and change the language (My Project > Assembly Info > Language). Then change your forms to that language. Repeat until you've done all the languages you want. Then, you can use different languages by changing the language in your assembly info.

[marcelosoy1]

ok so how can i apply that in my proyect.?

i have a form where there is a combox with all the languages available to run the program you select one item from the combox and click accept and the program should run in that language how would it be?

[Grimfort]

I am guessing you are sending out the list of strings to a translator, there are methods (and add-ins) that do this for you. I have not used any of them but its got to be quicker to set this up now before you have bags of code to change.

[marcelosoy1]

I am guessing you are sending out the list of strings to a translator, there are methods (and add-ins) that do this for you. I have not used any of them but its got to be quicker to set this up now before you have bags of code to change.

yeah a professor told me there was some kind of plugin that could help with the translation thing or make that proccess easier i think this is what he was talking about

[minitech]

ok so how can i apply that in my proyect.?

i have a form where there is a combox with all the languages available to run the program you select one item from the combox and click accept and the program should run in that language how would it be?

I just gave you step-by-step instructions on how to apply that in your project, really - don't use a ComboBox in your application, have a ComboBox in your installer.

Anyways, you could just keep with the 2 methods I gave you, if they're already working.