C# gotoxy function - console application

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In C# console application, it is often necessary to display text at a particular row and column. There is no in build function available to do that, even then we can implement our own function for gotoxy to move the cursor at a particulat location and clrscr for clearing the screen. You can find the C# source code on this page.

 

Note that you need to use console API functions available kernel32.dll

 

 

Source Code

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using System;

using System.Text;

using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

 

 

namespace ConsoleHelperFunction

{

   

    public class ConsoleHelper

    {

        [StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)]

        struct POSITION

        {

            public short x;

            public short y;

        }

 

        // http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms682073

        [DllImport("kernel32.dll", EntryPoint = "GetStdHandle", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Auto, CallingConvention = CallingConvention.StdCall)]

        private static extern int GetStdHandle(int nStdHandle);

 

        [DllImport("kernel32.dll", EntryPoint = "SetConsoleCursorPosition", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Auto, CallingConvention = CallingConvention.StdCall)]

        private static extern int SetConsoleCursorPosition(int hConsoleOutput, POSITION dwCursorPosition);

 

        public void gotoxy(short x, short y)

        {

            const int STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE = -11;

            int hConsoleHandle = GetStdHandle(STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE);

            POSITION position;

            position.x = x;

            position.y = y;

            SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsoleHandle, position);

        }

 

        [StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)]

        struct CONSOLERECT

        {

            public short Left;

            public short Top;

            public short Right;

            public short Bottom;

        }

 

        [StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)]

        struct CONSOLEBUFFER

        {

            public POSITION size;

            public POSITION position;

            public int attrib;

            public CONSOLERECT window;

            public POSITION maxsize;

        }

 

        [DllImport("kernel32.dll", EntryPoint = "FillConsoleOutputCharacter", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Auto, CallingConvention = CallingConvention.StdCall)]

        private static extern int FillConsoleOutputCharacter(int handleConsoleOutput, byte fillchar, int len, POSITION writecord, ref int numberofbyeswritten);

 

        [DllImport("kernel32.dll", EntryPoint = "GetConsoleScreenBufferInfo", SetLastError = true, CharSet = CharSet.Auto, CallingConvention = CallingConvention.StdCall)]

        private static extern int GetConsoleScreenBufferInfo(int handleConsoleOutput, ref CONSOLEBUFFER bufferinfo);

 

        public void ClearScreen() // clrscr

        {

            const int STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE = -11;

            int hConsoleHandle = GetStdHandle(STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE);

 

            int hWrittenChars = 0;

            CONSOLEBUFFER strConsoleInfo = new CONSOLEBUFFER();

            POSITION pos;

            pos.x = pos.y = 0;

            GetConsoleScreenBufferInfo(hConsoleHandle, ref strConsoleInfo);

            FillConsoleOutputCharacter(hConsoleHandle, 32, strConsoleInfo.size.x * strConsoleInfo.size.y, pos, ref hWrittenChars);

            SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsoleHandle, pos);

        }

    }

}

 

Output

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