C# Changing a picturebox image to users search from a textbox

March 17, 2022

This probably doesn’t make a lot of sense, but I’m trying to change the image of a PictureBox to a users request if a user has searched for it and it matches one in a current string.

I keep receiving a "System.ArgumentException: ‘Parameter is not valid.’" when I run it.

string[] TShirts = new string[] { "New York", "Melbourne", "London", "Sydney", "Los Angeles" };
// each value in the array has the same name as the images in the resources

for (int i = 0; i < TShirts.Length; i++ )
{
    if (txtSearch.Text == TShirts[i])
    {
        string x = TShirts[i];
       ptbItem.Image = new Bitmap(x); // error occurs here (this is what I can't work out)
    }
}

I’m really sorry for my poor explaining, I hope you can understand what I mean.

>Solution :

You can use the ResourceManager to access resources by name at run-time.
You can pass a string to its GetObject() method and cast to the resource Type.

For example:

int idx = Array.IndexOf(TShirts, txtSearch.Text);

if (idx >= 0) {
    ptbItem.Image?.Dispose();
    ptbItem.Image = (Bitmap)Properties.Resources.ResourceManager.GetObject(TShirts[idx]);
}