Making Use of the Repeater Web Server Control
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If you had a chance to read my two articles detailing the use of the DataGrid web server control (
Return of the DataGrid and
Behold the Power of the DataGrid), then no doubt you're excited to see how great .Net is for Rapid Application Development. However, you may have found the DataGrid a little inflexible for your needs. Perhaps you wanted to alter the output, and don't like being constrained to a <table>. Well, if you can do without the fancy editing and sorting functionality, then the Repeater Control is just the Control for your needs.
Introduction
What exactly is a Repeater Web Server Control, and what does it do? To over-simplify and encapsulate the answers to both questions at once, a Repeater is a mechanism for repeating data. Hence the name. If you'd like a little more detail (of course you do, otherwise you wouldn't be the type to be researching on ASPFree!), a Repeater is a template-controlled data-bound list.
Now when I say template-controlled, what I mean is that you have to specify what data you wish to repeat, and in what layout. But beyond that there are four optional areas of the Repeater that can be controlled through separate templates.
The Repeater also offers the option of embedding other controls within itself, and then bubbling up and capturing events from those controls.
These capabilities just mentioned combine to offer what is a very flexible way to handle something such as a shopping cart application. And that is precisely what this article will show you how to do, step by step.
Next: Get the Data >>
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