Microsoft KB Archive/110958

= How to Right Justify Items in List Box w/ Tabs & SendMessage =

Article ID: 110958

Article Last Modified on 10/29/2003

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Visual Basic 3.0 Professional Edition
 * Microsoft Visual Basic 3.0 Professional Edition

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This article was previously published under Q110958



SUMMARY
The sample program below shows how to right justify items in a list box.



MORE INFORMATION
This program calls the SendMessage Windows API function to set a tab stop at every character position in the list box. The program prefixes the appropriate number of tabs to right justify each string in the list box. You need to set the maximum allowed string length in the program.

Step-by-Step Example
 Start a new project in Visual Basic. Form1 is created by default. Add a large list box (List1) to Form1.  Add the following to the Form Load event code: Sub Form_Load

Const WM_USER = &H400 Const LB_SETTABSTOPS = WM_USER + 19 Const maxlen = 10 ' Maximum expected string length in list box. tabchar = Chr$(9) ' ASCII code for a tab ReDim a$(maxlen) ' String array to right justify in list box. form1.Show       ' Must Show form in Load event before Print ' will become visible.

' GetDialogBaseUnits API function lets you calculate the average ' width of characters in the system font. bu& = GetDialogBaseUnits hiword = bu& \ (2 ^ 16)   ' 16 pixels high in default system font. loword = bu& And &HFFFF&  ' 8 pixels wide in default system font. Print "System font width and height, in pixels:  " & loword, hiword

'Assign the array of defined tab stops. Static tabs(1 To maxlen) As Integer For j = 1 To maxlen ' Set tabs every 4 dialog units (one character): tabs(j) = (loword * j) / 2 ' On most Windows systems, you need only this: tabs(j) = j * 4 Next

'Send message to the List1 control through the Windows message queue: retVal& = SendMessage(List1.hWnd, LB_SETTABSTOPS, maxlen, tabs(1))

For j = 1 To maxlen a$(j) = String$(j, "a") ' Assign an arbitrary character string. ' Add the appropriate number of tabstops to right justify: tabstring = String$(maxlen + 1 - Len(a$(j)), Chr$(9)) List1.AddItem tabstring & a$(j) Next

End Sub

  Add the following Windows API declarations to the General Declarations section: Declare Function GetDialogBaseUnits Lib "User" As Long ' Enter the following Declare statement on one, single line: Declare Function SendMessage Lib "user" (ByVal hWnd As Integer,     ByVal wMsg As Integer, ByVal wp As Integer, lp As Any) As Long

 Start the program, or press the F5 key. All strings are right-justified in the list box. Close the form to end the program.

Additional query words: 3.00 alignment right-align align

Keywords: KB110958

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