Hej! Kan man på något sätt få en combobox att ta emot mer än 32 736 rader?

Har ett utdrag från "Interface Hall of Shame" http://www.iarchitect.com/mshame.htm

This type of control is seen all too often in corporate applications: drop-down controls and lists that contain thousands of entries. Programmers who mistakenly use it generally get a hint that it might be inappropriate when they find out that it takes an extraordinarily long time to load the form.

The following message, posted in a Visual Basic programmers forum on December 11, 1996, is typical:

I want to fill a list box with 2000 items ... This takes incredibly long ... over 20 minutes. Any ideas?

And another posted on December 16th, 1996, is somewhat less typical:

I'm looking for a list box control that can ... hold large numbers of entries (20,000+)

The excuse for such unwieldy controls is often a misguided interpretation of the almighty call to arms, "We must ensure data integrity." The programmers want to make sure that the user specifies a valid entry; in their view, the best way to do this is to force the user to select from a list. That would be fine if you had, say 20, 60, or maybe even 100 items in the list. Beyond that number, the fact that the user can only scroll a handful of items at a time causes the control to become unwieldy.

Imagine if you didn't have folders and directories on your hard drive. Whenever you needed to specify a file, you were presented with a drop-down control containing the name of every file on your hard drive, and asked to select the one you wanted to open. Few people, programmers included, would consider such a method as anything less than completely unacceptable.

All data can be organized in some meaningful way that will allow the user to more rapidly access the specific information he or she is interested in. Files are organized into folders or directories for example. Employees are often categorized by department, job title, or salary grade. Designing the interface to exploit the appropriate organization will allow the user to more rapidly locate the desired information, while at the same time, "ensuring data integrity."

Jag förstår piken. Men i mitt fall hade det passat alldeles ypperligt med en combobox!