Get a Windows Forms control by name in C#

Question

I have a ToolStripMenuItem called myMenu. How can I access this like so:

/* Normally, I would do: */
this.myMenu... etc.

/* But ho         


        

Answer 1

Assuming you have the menuStrip object and the menu is only one level deep, use:

ToolStripMenuItem item = menuStrip.Items
    .OfType()
    .SelectMany(it => it.DropDownItems.OfType())
    .SingleOrDefault(n => n.Name == "MyMenu");

For deeper menu levels add more SelectMany operators in the statement.

if you want to search all menu items in the strip then use

ToolStripMenuItem item = menuStrip.Items
    .Find("MyMenu",true)
    .OfType()
    .Single();

However, make sure each menu has a different name to avoid exception thrown by key duplicates.

To avoid exceptions you could use FirstOrDefault instead of SingleOrDefault / Single, or just return a sequence if you might have Name duplicates.