ASP.NET 4 Unleashed

Determining the Selected List Item

Displaying options with the List controls is all very nice, but at some point you need to determine which option a user has selected. The List controls support three properties that you can use to determine the selected list item:

• SelectedIndex— Gets or sets the index of the selected list item.

• SelectedItem— Gets the first selected list item.

• SelectedValue— Gets or sets the value of the first selected list item.

For example, the page in Listing 10.4 enables you to select an item from the DropDownList control and display the value of the selected item’s Text property (see Figure 10.4).

Figure 10.4. Selecting an item from a DropDownList control.

Listing 10.4. SelectMovie.aspx

The SelectedItem property ...