Accessing Controls Inside Templates

If your RadTabStrip has items with templates that have embedded controls, you may want to access the properties of those embedded controls. To get a reference to the embedded control, locate the RadTabthat has the template, and use its FindControl method.

For example, consider the following, very simple, tab strip:

<telerik:radtabstrip id="RadTabStrip1" runat="server" selectedindex="0" ontabclick="RadTabStrip1_TabClick">
    <Tabs>         
        <telerik:RadTab runat="server" Text="Products" Selected="True" SelectedIndex="0">      
    <Tabs>        
        <telerik:RadTab runat="server" Text="Food" Selected="True" />        
        <telerik:RadTab runat="server" Text="Electronics" />      
    </Tabs>    
    </telerik:RadTab>    
    <telerik:RadTab runat="server" Text="Tours">      
    <Tabs>        
        <telerik:RadTab runat="server" Text="Europe" />        
        <telerik:RadTab runat="server" Text="South Pacific" />      
    </Tabs>    
    </telerik:RadTab> 
    </Tabs>  
    <TabTemplate>     
        <asp:CheckBox ID="CheckBox1" Text='<%# DataBinder.Eval(Container, "Text") %>' 
           Checked='<%# DataBinder.Eval(Container, "Selected") %>' runat="server" />  
    </TabTemplate>
</telerik:radtabstrip>

• Server-side access

The TabClick event handler uses the FindControl method to locate the CheckBox in the template, so that it can be synchronized with the Selected property:

protected void RadTabStrip1_TabClick(object sender, RadTabStripEventArgs e) 
{ 
    for (int i = 0; i < RadTabStrip1.Tabs.Count; i++) 
    { 
        RadTab tab = RadTabStrip1.Tabs[i];
        CheckBox c = (CheckBox)tab.FindControl("CheckBox1"); 
        c.Checked = tab.Selected; 
        for (int j = 0; j < tab.Tabs.Count; j++) 
        { 
            RadTab child = tab.Tabs[j]; c = (CheckBox)child.FindControl("CheckBox1"); 
            c.Checked = child.Selected; 
        } 
    } 
}   

Protected Sub RadTabStrip1_TabClick(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As RadTabStripEventArgs) Handles RadTabStrip1.TabClick
    Dim i As Integer = 0
    While i < RadTabStrip1.Tabs.Count

        Dim tab As RadTab = RadTabStrip1.Tabs(i)
        Dim c As CheckBox = CType(tab.FindControl("CheckBox1"), CheckBox)
        c.Checked = tab.Selected
        Dim j As Integer = 0
        While j < tab.Tabs.Count
            Dim child As RadTab = tab.Tabs(j)
            c = CType(child.FindControl("CheckBox1"), CheckBox)
            c.Checked = child.Selected
            System.Math.Max(System.Threading.Interlocked.Increment(j), j - 1)
        End While
        System.Math.Max(System.Threading.Interlocked.Increment(i), i - 1)
    End While
End Sub 

• Client-side access

The client-side findControl method can be used to find an embedded Control's client-side object. For example, if there is a RadToolBar instead of a CheckBox in the example above, the client-side object of the ToolBar can be obtained, like this:

var tabStrip = $find("<%= RadTabStrip1.ClientID %>;");
var tab = tabStrip.findTabByText("Europe");
var toolBar = tab.findControl("RadToolBar1");