How to implement full row selecting in GridView without select button?

Solution 1:

You must add this on every postback and not only on databinding. Therefore you should use the RowCreated-Event of the GridView.

For example

(C#):

protected void GridView1_RowCreated(object sender, System.Web.UI.WebControls.GridViewRowEventArgs e)
{
    if (e.Row.RowType == DataControlRowType.DataRow) {
        e.Row.Attributes["onmouseover"] = "this.style.cursor='pointer';this.style.textDecoration='underline';";
        e.Row.Attributes["onmouseout"] = "this.style.textDecoration='none';";
        e.Row.ToolTip = "Click to select row";
        e.Row.Attributes["onclick"] = this.Page.ClientScript.GetPostBackClientHyperlink(this.GridView1, "Select$" + e.Row.RowIndex);
    }
}

(VB.Net):

Private Sub GridView1_RowCreated(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.Web.UI.WebControls.GridViewRowEventArgs) Handles GridView1.RowCreated
    If e.Row.RowType = DataControlRowType.DataRow Then
        e.Row.Attributes("onmouseover") = "this.style.cursor='pointer';this.style.textDecoration='underline';"
        e.Row.Attributes("onmouseout") = "this.style.textDecoration='none';"
        e.Row.ToolTip = "Click to select row"
        e.Row.Attributes("onclick") = Me.Page.ClientScript.GetPostBackClientHyperlink(Me.GridView1, "Select$" & e.Row.RowIndex)
    End If
End Sub

Solution 2:

Instead of doing it on RowCreated, you could do it on Render(). That way you could use the overload of GetPostBackClientHyperlink with true on registerForEventValidation and avoid the "invalid postback/callback argument" error.

Something like this:

protected override void Render(HtmlTextWriter writer)
    {
      foreach (GridViewRow r in GridView1.Rows)
      {
        if (r.RowType == DataControlRowType.DataRow)
        {
          r.Attributes["onmouseover"] = "this.style.cursor='pointer';this.style.textDecoration='underline';";
          r.Attributes["onmouseout"] = "this.style.textDecoration='none';";
          r.ToolTip = "Click to select row";
          r.Attributes["onclick"] = this.Page.ClientScript.GetPostBackClientHyperlink(this.GridView1, "Select$" + r.RowIndex,true);

        }
      }

      base.Render(writer);
    }

Solution 3:

<style type="text/css">
    .hiddenColumn
    {
        display: none;
    }

    .rowGrid
    {
        cursor: pointer;
    }
</style>

<asp:GridView runat="server" ID="GridView1" AutoGenerateColumns="true" >
            <RowStyle CssClass="rowGrid" />
            <Columns>
                <asp:CommandField ButtonType="Button" ShowSelectButton="true" HeaderStyle-CssClass="hiddenColumn"
                    ItemStyle-CssClass="hiddenColumn" FooterStyle-CssClass="hiddenColumn" />
            </Columns>
        </asp:GridView>

<script type="text/javascript">
        $(function () {
            $("#<%= GridView1.ClientID %> tr.rowGrid")
            .live("click", function (event) {
                $(this).find("input[type='button'][value='Select']").click();
            });

            $("#<%= GridView1.ClientID %> input[type='button'][value='Select']")
                .live("click", function (event) {
                    event.stopPropagation();
                });

        });
    </script>