How to use C# WPF ListView with variable number of columns

Question

I would like to load some data from external various source such as text file, csv file, user input, etc, and display in a list view using C# WPF. I need to display one source at a time only, and the number of columns is fixed within one source, but different sources may contain different number of columns, e.g.,

File1 may have following column: Name, Number, Cat1, Cat2, Cat3

File2 may have following column: Name, Number, CatA, CatB

File3 may have following column: Name, Index, Type1, ..., TypeN

...

Seems that the listview in C# WPF can only be used with a known number of columns, is it possible to use listview which the number of columns is only known in the RUNTIME, similar to the above data? or I should use a different approach, I have no idea yet. Thanks.

i would use a datagrid instead of a listview. create a datatable from the csv data(or similar with other source types) and bind the datagrid to that datatable — Florian Schmidinger
– Florian Schmidinger, Commented Feb 23, 2015 at 7:12

Florian Schmidinger · Accepted Answer · 2015-02-23 08:08:24Z

To convert csv to table (just an example, there are libraries out there that do this job better):

public static class ExtensionMethods
{
    public static DataTable ConvertToDataTable(this string input)
    {
        DataTable result = new DataTable();

        using (StringReader reader = new StringReader(input))
        {
            string[] columnNames = reader.ReadLine().Split(';'); //or other character
            foreach (var columnName in columnNames)
            {
                result.Columns.Add(columnName, typeof(string));
            }
            while (reader.Peek() > 0)
            {
                result.Rows.Add(reader.ReadLine().Split(';'));
            }
        }
        return result;
    }

}

Example of the UI:

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication2.MainWindow"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
<Grid>
    <Grid.RowDefinitions>
        <RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
        <RowDefinition/>
    </Grid.RowDefinitions>
    <Button Name="btnLoad" Content="Load" Click="BtnLoad_OnClick"/>
    <DataGrid Name="dgData" Grid.Row="1" ItemsSource="{Binding}"/>

</Grid>
</Window>

and the proper code behind:

public partial class MainWindow : Window
{
    private DataTable table;

    public MainWindow()
    {
        InitializeComponent();
    }

    private void BtnLoad_OnClick(object senderIn, RoutedEventArgs eIn)
    {
        OpenFileDialog dialog = new OpenFileDialog();
        if (dialog.ShowDialog() == true)
        {
            string content = File.ReadAllText(dialog.FileName);
            table = content.ConvertToDataTable();
            dgData.DataContext = table;

        }

    }
}

Tested with data:

Name;Number;Cat1;Cat2;Cat3
someName;someNumber;someCat1;someCat2;someCat3
someOtherName;someOtherNumber;someOtherCat1;someOtherCat2;someOtherCat3

And looks like:

enter image description here

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