Convert generic List/Enumerable to DataTable?

Question

I have few methods that returns different Generic Lists.

Exists in .net any class static method or whatever to convert any list into a datatable? The only thing tha

Answer 1

  using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.UI;
using System.Web.UI.WebControls;
using System.Data;
using System.ComponentModel;

public partial class Default3 : System.Web.UI.Page
{
    protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        DataTable dt = new DataTable();
        dt = lstEmployee.ConvertToDataTable();
    }
    public static DataTable ConvertToDataTable<T>(IList<T> list) where T : class
    {
        try
        {
            DataTable table = CreateDataTable<T>();
            Type objType = typeof(T);
            PropertyDescriptorCollection properties = TypeDescriptor.GetProperties(objType);
            foreach (T item in list)
            {
                DataRow row = table.NewRow();
                foreach (PropertyDescriptor property in properties)
                {
                    if (!CanUseType(property.PropertyType)) continue;
                    row[property.Name] = property.GetValue(item) ?? DBNull.Value;
                }

                table.Rows.Add(row);
            }
            return table;
        }
        catch (DataException ex)
        {
            return null;
        }
        catch (Exception ex)
        {
            return null;
        }

    }
    private static DataTable CreateDataTable<T>() where T : class
    {
        Type objType = typeof(T);
        DataTable table = new DataTable(objType.Name);
        PropertyDescriptorCollection properties = TypeDescriptor.GetProperties(objType);
        foreach (PropertyDescriptor property in properties)
        {
            Type propertyType = property.PropertyType;
            if (!CanUseType(propertyType)) continue;

            //nullables must use underlying types
            if (propertyType.IsGenericType && propertyType.GetGenericTypeDefinition() == typeof(Nullable<>))
                propertyType = Nullable.GetUnderlyingType(propertyType);
            //enums also need special treatment
            if (propertyType.IsEnum)
                propertyType = Enum.GetUnderlyingType(propertyType);
            table.Columns.Add(property.Name, propertyType);
        }
        return table;
    }


    private static bool CanUseType(Type propertyType)
    {
        //only strings and value types
        if (propertyType.IsArray) return false;
        if (!propertyType.IsValueType && propertyType != typeof(string)) return false;
        return true;
    }
}

Answer 2

To Convert Generic list into DataTable

using Newtonsoft.Json;

public DataTable GenericToDataTable(IList<T> list)
{
    var json = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(list);
    DataTable dt = (DataTable)JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(json, (typeof(DataTable)));
    return dt;
}

Answer 3

This is the simple Console Application to convert List to Datatable.

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Data;
using System.ComponentModel;

namespace ConvertListToDataTable
{
    public static class Program
    {
        public static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            List<MyObject> list = new List<MyObject>();
            for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++)
            {
                list.Add(new MyObject { Sno = i, Name = i.ToString() + "-KarthiK", Dat = DateTime.Now.AddSeconds(i) });
            }

            DataTable dt = ConvertListToDataTable(list);
            foreach (DataRow row in dt.Rows)
            {
                Console.WriteLine();
                for (int x = 0; x < dt.Columns.Count; x++)
                {
                    Console.Write(row[x].ToString() + " ");
                }
            }
            Console.ReadLine();
        }

        public class MyObject
        {
            public int Sno { get; set; }
            public string Name { get; set; }
            public DateTime Dat { get; set; }
        }

        public static DataTable ConvertListToDataTable<T>(this List<T> iList)
        {
            DataTable dataTable = new DataTable();
            PropertyDescriptorCollection props = TypeDescriptor.GetProperties(typeof(T));
            for (int i = 0; i < props.Count; i++)
            {
                PropertyDescriptor propertyDescriptor = props[i];
                Type type = propertyDescriptor.PropertyType;

                if (type.IsGenericType && type.GetGenericTypeDefinition() == typeof(Nullable<>))
                    type = Nullable.GetUnderlyingType(type);

                dataTable.Columns.Add(propertyDescriptor.Name, type);
            }
            object[] values = new object[props.Count];
            foreach (T iListItem in iList)
            {
                for (int i = 0; i < values.Length; i++)
                {
                    values[i] = props[i].GetValue(iListItem);
                }
                dataTable.Rows.Add(values);
            }
            return dataTable;
        }
    }
}

Answer 4

Here's a nice 2013 update using FastMember from NuGet:

IEnumerable<SomeType> data = ...
DataTable table = new DataTable();
using(var reader = ObjectReader.Create(data)) {
    table.Load(reader);
}

This uses FastMember's meta-programming API for maximum performance. If you want to restrict it to particular members (or enforce the order), then you can do that too:

IEnumerable<SomeType> data = ...
DataTable table = new DataTable();
using(var reader = ObjectReader.Create(data, "Id", "Name", "Description")) {
    table.Load(reader);
}

Editor's Dis/claimer: FastMember is a Marc Gravell project. It's gold and full-on flies!

---

Yes, this is pretty much the exact opposite of this one; reflection would suffice - or if you need quicker, HyperDescriptor in 2.0, or maybe Expression in 3.5. Actually, HyperDescriptor should be more than adequate.

For example:

// remove "this" if not on C# 3.0 / .NET 3.5
public static DataTable ToDataTable<T>(this IList<T> data)
{
    PropertyDescriptorCollection props =
        TypeDescriptor.GetProperties(typeof(T));
    DataTable table = new DataTable();
    for(int i = 0 ; i < props.Count ; i++)
    {
        PropertyDescriptor prop = props[i];
        table.Columns.Add(prop.Name, prop.PropertyType);
    }
    object[] values = new object[props.Count];
    foreach (T item in data)
    {
        for (int i = 0; i < values.Length; i++)
        {
            values[i] = props[i].GetValue(item);
        }
        table.Rows.Add(values);
    }
    return table;        
}

Now with one line you can make this many many times faster than reflection (by enabling HyperDescriptor for the object-type T).

---

Edit re performance query; here's a test rig with results:

Vanilla 27179
Hyper   6997

I suspect that the bottleneck has shifted from member-access to DataTable performance... I doubt you'll improve much on that...

Code:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Data;
using System.Diagnostics;
public class MyData
{
    public int A { get; set; }
    public string B { get; set; }
    public DateTime C { get; set; }
    public decimal D { get; set; }
    public string E { get; set; }
    public int F { get; set; }
}

static class Program
{
    static void RunTest(List<MyData> data, string caption)
    {
        GC.Collect(GC.MaxGeneration, GCCollectionMode.Forced);
        GC.WaitForPendingFinalizers();
        GC.WaitForFullGCComplete();
        Stopwatch watch = Stopwatch.StartNew();
        for (int i = 0; i < 500; i++)
        {
            data.ToDataTable();
        }
        watch.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine(caption + "\t" + watch.ElapsedMilliseconds);
    }
    static void Main()
    {
        List<MyData> foos = new List<MyData>();
        for (int i = 0 ; i < 5000 ; i++ ){
            foos.Add(new MyData
            { // just gibberish...
                A = i,
                B = i.ToString(),
                C = DateTime.Now.AddSeconds(i),
                D = i,
                E = "hello",
                F = i * 2
            });
        }
        RunTest(foos, "Vanilla");
        Hyper.ComponentModel.HyperTypeDescriptionProvider.Add(
            typeof(MyData));
        RunTest(foos, "Hyper");
        Console.ReadLine(); // return to exit        
    }
}

Answer 5

I also had to come up with an alternate solution, as none of the options listed here worked in my case. I was using an IEnumerable which returned an IEnumerable and the properties couldn't be enumerated. This did the trick:

// remove "this" if not on C# 3.0 / .NET 3.5
public static DataTable ConvertToDataTable<T>(this IEnumerable<T> data)
{
    List<IDataRecord> list = data.Cast<IDataRecord>().ToList();

    PropertyDescriptorCollection props = null;
    DataTable table = new DataTable();
    if (list != null && list.Count > 0)
    {
        props = TypeDescriptor.GetProperties(list[0]);
        for (int i = 0; i < props.Count; i++)
        {
            PropertyDescriptor prop = props[i];
            table.Columns.Add(prop.Name, Nullable.GetUnderlyingType(prop.PropertyType) ?? prop.PropertyType);
        }
    }
    if (props != null)
    {
        object[] values = new object[props.Count];
        foreach (T item in data)
        {
            for (int i = 0; i < values.Length; i++)
            {
                values[i] = props[i].GetValue(item) ?? DBNull.Value;
            }
            table.Rows.Add(values);
        }
    }
    return table;
}

Answer 6

 Dim counties As New List(Of County)
 Dim dtCounties As DataTable
 dtCounties = _combinedRefRepository.Get_Counties()
 If dtCounties.Rows.Count <> 0 Then
    For Each row As DataRow In dtCounties.Rows
      Dim county As New County
      county.CountyId = row.Item(0).ToString()
      county.CountyName = row.Item(1).ToString().ToUpper()
      counties.Add(county)
    Next
    dtCounties.Dispose()
 End If