Creating a new Text Document from DataGridView

Question

I've been trying to export my data from my DataGridView into a text file, it only works when I already have a txt doc, but I want it to auto generate new ones after every button click. Help would be appreciated. This is similar to what I have now:

TextWriter writer = new StreamWriter(@"C:\folder\Text.txt");
for(int i = 0; i < dataGridView1.Rows.Count-1; i++)
{
     for(int j = 0; j < dataGridView1.Columns.Count; j++)
     {                        
          writer.Write("\t"+dataGridView1.Rows[i].Cells[j].Value.ToString()+"\t"+"|");
     }
     writer.WriteLine("");
     writer.WriteLine("-----------------------------------------------------");
}
 writer.Close();
 MessageBox.Show("Data Exported");

It works now, thanks for the help. Anyone interested here's the code:

string datetime = DateTime.Now.ToString("yyyy-MMMM-dddd-HH-mm-ss");
        string filePath = $@"C:\folder\{datetime}.txt";

        TextWriter writer = new StreamWriter(filePath);
        for (int i = 0; i < dataGridView1.Rows.Count - 1; i++)
        {
            for (int j = 0; j < dataGridView1.Columns.Count; j++)
            {
                writer.Write("\t" + dataGridView1.Rows[i].Cells[j].Value.ToString() + "\t" + "|");
            }
            writer.WriteLine("");
            writer.WriteLine("-----------------------------------------------------");
        }
        writer.Close();
        //MessageBox.Show("Data Exported");

Possible duplicate of [Creating text file in C#](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/27823789/creating-text-file-in-c-sharp) — Cizzl, Mar 21 '19 at 08:36

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 21 '19 at 08:16

0

You can create before this code your own text file like this:

string path = "C:\folder\Text.txt";
if (!File.Exists(path))
{
    File.Create(path);
}

with file exist you can check if the file already exists, if not then create it.

answered Mar 21 '19 at 08:16

Cizzl

324
2
11

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 21 '19 at 08:20

Try to use File.WriteAllText

string path = "C:\folder\Text"
for(int j = 0; j < dataGridView1.Columns.Count; j++)
{
File.WriteAllText(path + j + ".txt", yourTextToWrite);
}

It will generate new file if .txt file is not existing.

To prepare yourTextToWrite you can use StringBuilder class:

StringBuilder yourTextToWrite = new StringBuilder();
yourTextToWrite.Append("text1\n");
yourTextToWrite.Append("text2\n");

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 21 '19 at 08:29

You just need to make some kind of unique name for your file. So do something like the below, where you use something (it's up to you what) like a DateTime string.

string datetime = DateTime.Now.ToString("yyyy-MM-dd-HHMM");
string filePath = $@"C:\folder\Text{datetime}.txt";
File.Create(filePath);
TextWriter writer = new StreamWriter(path);
for(int i = 0; i < dataGridView1.Rows.Count-1; i++)
{
     for(int j = 0; j < dataGridView1.Columns.Count; j++)
     {                        
          writer.Write("\t"+dataGridView1.Rows[i].Cells[j].Value.ToString()+"\t"+"|");
     }
     writer.WriteLine("");
     writer.WriteLine("-----------------------------------------------------");
}
 writer.Close();
 MessageBox.Show("Data Exported");

Have a look at the documentation around File. There are lots of examples on how one should work with files.

In the 4th line of text, did you mean new StreamWriter(path) or new StreamWriter(filePath). When i used i got the error that the textfile is being used by another process. — , Mar 21 '19 at 08:39
Sorry, I didn't test it, but was trying to get the concept across more than write the exact code you needed. I take it it helped though? — Topher, Mar 21 '19 at 10:41
Yes i just had to edit some lines but other than that it worked, thanks allot mate. — , Mar 21 '19 at 10:43

Creating a new Text Document from DataGridView

3 Answers3