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How to: Remove Autogenerated Columns from a Windows Forms DataGridView Control

When your DataGridView control is set to autogenerate its columns based on data from its data source, you can selectively omit certain columns. You can do this by calling the Remove method on the Columns collection. Alternatively, you can hide columns from view by setting the Visible property to false. This technique is useful when you want to display the hidden columns in certain conditions, or when you need to access the data in the columns without displaying it.

Another approach is to prevent columns from being auto-generated in the first place by setting the ColumnMapping property of the underlying DataColumn to Hidden. This tells the DataGridView to skip creating a column for that particular data column during auto-generation.

To remove autogenerated columns

  • Call the Remove method on the Columns collection.

    dataGridView1.AutoGenerateColumns = true;
dataGridView1.DataSource = customersDataSet;
dataGridView1.Columns.Remove("Fax");

    With dataGridView1
    .AutoGenerateColumns = True
    .DataSource = customersDataSet
    .Columns.Remove("Fax")
End With

To hide autogenerated columns

  • Set the column's Visible property to false.

    dataGridView1.Columns["CustomerID"].Visible = false;

    dataGridView1.Columns("CustomerID").Visible = False

To prevent columns from being autogenerated

  • Set the ColumnMapping property of the data source's DataColumn to Hidden.

    // Assuming you have a DataTable with a column you want to exclude
dataTable.Columns["SensitiveData"].ColumnMapping = MappingType.Hidden;

    ' Assuming you have a DataTable with a column you want to exclude
dataTable.Columns("SensitiveData").ColumnMapping = MappingType.Hidden

Example

private void BindDataAndInitializeColumns()
{
    dataGridView1.AutoGenerateColumns = true;
    dataGridView1.DataSource = customersDataSet;
    dataGridView1.Columns.Remove("Fax");
    dataGridView1.Columns["CustomerID"].Visible = false;
}

Private Sub BindDataAndInitializeColumns()

    With dataGridView1
        .AutoGenerateColumns = True
        .DataSource = customersDataSet
        .Columns.Remove("Fax")
        .Columns("CustomerID").Visible = False
    End With

End Sub

Compiling the Code

This example requires:

  • A DataGridView control named dataGridView1 bound to a table that contains Fax and CustomerID columns, such as the Customers table in the Northwind sample database.

  • References to the System and System.Windows.Forms assemblies.

See also