How can I easily view the contents of a datatable or dataview in the immediate window

Question

Sometimes I will be at a breakpoint in my code and I want to view the contents of a DataTable variable (or a DataTable in a DataSet).

Answer 1

To beautify adinas's debugger output I made some simple formattings:

    public void DebugTable(DataTable table)
    {
        Debug.WriteLine("--- DebugTable(" + table.TableName + ") ---");
        int zeilen = table.Rows.Count;
        int spalten = table.Columns.Count;

        // Header
        for (int i = 0; i < table.Columns.Count; i++)
        {
            string s = table.Columns[i].ToString();
            Debug.Write(String.Format("{0,-20} | ", s));
        }
        Debug.Write(Environment.NewLine);
        for (int i = 0; i < table.Columns.Count; i++)
        {
            Debug.Write("---------------------|-");
        }
        Debug.Write(Environment.NewLine);

        // Data
        for (int i = 0; i < zeilen; i++)
        {
            DataRow row = table.Rows[i];
            //Debug.WriteLine("{0} {1} ", row[0], row[1]);
            for (int j = 0; j < spalten; j++)
            {
                string s = row[j].ToString();
                if (s.Length > 20) s = s.Substring(0, 17) + "...";
                Debug.Write(String.Format("{0,-20} | ", s));
            }
            Debug.Write(Environment.NewLine);
        }
        for (int i = 0; i < table.Columns.Count; i++)
        {
            Debug.Write("---------------------|-");
        }
        Debug.Write(Environment.NewLine);
    }

Best of this solution: You don't need Visual Studio! Here my example output:

SELECT PackKurz, PackName, PackGewicht FROM verpackungen

PackKurz             | PackName             | PackGewicht          | 
---------------------|----------------------|----------------------|-
BB205                | BigBag 205 kg        | 205                  | 
BB300                | BigBag 300 kg        | 300                  | 
BB365                | BigBag 365 kg        | 365                  | 
CO                   | Container, Alteru... |                      | 
EP                   | Palette              |                      | 
IBC                  | Chemikaliengefäß ... |                      | 
lose                 | nicht verpackungs... | 0                    | 
---------------------|----------------------|----------------------|-