How can you change the text orientation in cells in the fixed rows in a Delphi TStringGrid

Question

I have a standard TStringGrid on a form. I have one Fixed Row in the grid that contains a number of columns, which are all TGridColumns objects. I have set the column titles using the object inspector and the default orientation is horizontal. Is there any way you can make the orientation vertical (like you can in cells in Excel)?

Machellemachete

Hi there, did you mean something like this ? Anyway what version of Delphi are you using ? I have D2009 and I have no TGridColumns class in there. – Bradbradan

@TLama, TGridColumns collection is FCL class, in VCL similar class has been introduced later, for TDBGrid. OP, please clarify on Excel part. – Disconsider

lazarus-ccr.sourceforge.net/docs/lcl/grids/tgridcolumns.html – Disconsider

@TLama, i think there will no problem with painting these "header" cells simply in OnDrawCell event (besides rectangle calculations, which is rather special for rotated font) i.imgur.com/m9Ja0.png – Disconsider

@TLama, ah, i got your point! Yeah, reinventing painting (including themed) is not practical. – Disconsider

Check the first part of my answer; if that post helped you, don't forget to accept it. And please clear your comments from here.. I'll already deleted mine so the conversation here became meaningless :) Thanks – Bradbradan

Answer 1

Here's how to render the first row's text vertically in Lazarus:

unit Unit1; 

{$mode objfpc}{$H+}

interface

uses
  Classes, SysUtils, FileUtil, Forms, Controls, Graphics, Dialogs, Grids,
  StdCtrls;

type
  TStringGrid = class(Grids.TStringGrid)
  protected
    procedure DrawCellText(ACol, ARow: Integer; ARect: TRect;
      AState: TGridDrawState; AText: String); override;
  end;

type
  TForm1 = class(TForm)
    Button1: TButton;
    StringGrid1: TStringGrid;
    procedure Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
  private
    { private declarations }
  public
    { public declarations }
  end; 

var
  Form1: TForm1; 

implementation

{$R *.lfm}

procedure TStringGrid.DrawCellText(ACol, ARow: Integer; ARect: TRect;
  AState: TGridDrawState; AText: String);
var
  TextPosition: TPoint;
begin
  if ARow = 0 then
  begin
    Canvas.Font.Orientation := 900;
    TextPosition.X := ARect.Left +
      ((ARect.Right - ARect.Left - Canvas.TextHeight(AText)) div 2);
    TextPosition.Y := ARect.Bottom -
      ((ARect.Bottom - ARect.Top - Canvas.TextWidth(AText)) div 2);
    Canvas.TextOut(TextPosition.X, TextPosition.Y, AText);
  end
  else
    inherited DrawCellText(ACol, ARow, ARect, AState, AText);
end;

procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
var
  I: Integer;
  GridColumn: TGridColumn;
begin
  for I := 0 to 4 do
  begin
    GridColumn := StringGrid1.Columns.Add;
    GridColumn.Width := 24;
    GridColumn.Title.Font.Orientation := 900;
    GridColumn.Title.Layout := tlBottom;
    GridColumn.Title.Caption := 'Column no. ' + IntToStr(I);
  end;
  StringGrid1.RowHeights[0] := 80;
end;

end.

Here's how to render the first row's text of the TStringGrid vertically in Delphi:

I would prefer to use the overriden DrawCell procedure because it seems to me as the easiest way to go because if you want to render the text simply in the OnDrawCell event then you should consider:

• if you'll have the DefaultDrawing set to True then the text will already be rendered when the OnDrawCell event is fired, so here I would recommend e.g. to store the cell captions in a separate variable, not into Cells property so then no text will be rendered and you can draw your own stored captions vertically
• if you'll have the DefaultDrawing set to False then you'll have to draw the whole cell by your own, including the 3D border, what is IMHO not so cool, and I would personally prefer to let the control draw the background for us
  

Here is the Delphi code which uses the overriden DrawCell procedure. The text is being centered inside of the cell rectangle; please note that I haven't used the DrawTextEx for text size measurement because this function doesn't take the changed font orientation into account.

unit Unit1;

interface

uses
  Windows, Messages, SysUtils, Variants, Classes, Graphics, Controls, Forms,
  Dialogs, StdCtrls, Grids;

type
  TStringGrid = class(Grids.TStringGrid)
  protected
    procedure DrawCell(ACol, ARow: Longint; ARect: TRect;
      AState: TGridDrawState); override;
  end;

type
  TForm1 = class(TForm)
    Button1: TButton;
    StringGrid1: TStringGrid;
    procedure Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
  private
    { Private declarations }
  public
    { Public declarations }
  end;

var
  Form1: TForm1;

implementation

{$R *.dfm}

procedure TStringGrid.DrawCell(ACol, ARow: Longint; ARect: TRect;
  AState: TGridDrawState);
var
  LogFont: TLogFont;
  TextPosition: TPoint;
  NewFontHandle: HFONT;
  OldFontHandle: HFONT;
begin
  if ARow = 0 then
  begin
    GetObject(Canvas.Font.Handle, SizeOf(LogFont), @LogFont);
    LogFont.lfEscapement := 900;
    LogFont.lfOrientation := LogFont.lfEscapement;
    NewFontHandle := CreateFontIndirect(LogFont);
    OldFontHandle := SelectObject(Canvas.Handle, NewFontHandle);
    TextPosition.X := ARect.Left +
      ((ARect.Right - ARect.Left - Canvas.TextHeight(Cells[ACol, ARow])) div 2);
    TextPosition.Y := ARect.Bottom -
      ((ARect.Bottom - ARect.Top - Canvas.TextWidth(Cells[ACol, ARow])) div 2);
    Canvas.TextRect(ARect, TextPosition.X, TextPosition.Y, Cells[ACol, ARow]);
    NewFontHandle := SelectObject(Canvas.Handle, OldFontHandle);
    DeleteObject(NewFontHandle);
  end
  else
    inherited DrawCell(ACol, ARow, ARect, AState);
end;

procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
var
  I: Integer;
begin
  for I := 0 to StringGrid1.ColCount - 1 do
  begin
    StringGrid1.ColWidths[I] := 24;
    StringGrid1.Cells[I, 0] := 'Column no. ' + IntToStr(I);
  end;
  StringGrid1.RowHeights[0] := 80;
end;

end.

And here's how it looks like:

Bradbradan