A
FolderBrowserDialog control is used to browse and select a folder on a computer.
A typical FolderBrowserDialog looks like Figure 1 where you can see Windows
Explorer like features to navigate through folders and select a folder.
Figure 1
Creating a FolderBrowserDialog
We can create a FolderBrowserDialog control using a Forms
designer at design-time or using the FolderBrowserDialog class in code at
run-time (also known as dynamically). Unlike other Windows Forms controls, a
FolderBrowserDialog does not have and not need visual properties like others.
Design-time
To create a FolderBrowserDialog control at design-time, you
simply drag and drop a FolderBrowserDialog control from Toolbox to a Form in
Visual Studio. After you drag and drop a FolderBrowserDialog on a Form, the
FolderBrowserDialog looks like Figure 2.
Figure 2
Adding a FolderBrowserDialog to a Form adds following two
lines of code.
Friend
WithEvents FolderBrowserDialog1
As System.Windows.Forms.FolderBrowserDialog
Me.FolderBrowserDialog1
= New System.Windows.Forms.FolderBrowserDialog()
Run-time
Creating
a FolderBrowserDialog control at run-time is merely a work of creating an
instance of FolderBrowserDialog class, set its properties and add
FolderBrowserDialog class to the Form controls.
First
step to create a dynamic FolderBrowserDialog is to create an instance of
FolderBrowserDialog class. The following code snippet creates an
FolderBrowserDialog control object.
Dim
folderDlg As New
FolderBrowserDialog
ShowDialog method displays the FolderBrowserDialog.
folderDlg.ShowDialog()
Once the ShowDialog method is called, you can browse and
select a file.
FolderBrowserDialog Properties
SelectedPath property represents the selected path in a FolderBrowserDialog
control.
RootFolder property represents the root folder where the browsing starts from.
ShowNewFolderButton property represents a value indicating whether the
New Folder button appears in the folder browser
dialog box.
The
following code snippet shows how to use a FolderBrowserDialog control and its
properties.
Private
Sub BrowseButton_Click(ByVal
sender As System.Object,
_
ByVal e As
System.EventArgs)
Handles BrowseButton.Click
Dim
folderDlg As New
FolderBrowserDialog
folderDlg.ShowNewFolderButton =
True
If (folderDlg.ShowDialog()
= DialogResult.OK) Then
TextBox1.Text =
folderDlg.SelectedPath
Dim
root As
Environment.SpecialFolder =
folderDlg.RootFolder
End
If
End
Sub
Summary
A
FolderBrowserDialog control allows users to launch Windows Folder Browser Dialog
and let users select a folder. In this article, we discussed how to use a
Windows Folder Browser Dialog and set its properties in a Windows Forms
application.