Input masks commonly contain literals. When the user enters characters into the System.Windows.Forms.MaskedTextBox at runtime, the current character position will sometimes fall on a literal. The MaskedTextBox.SkipLiterals property describes how user input for the next character is to be handled, as follows:

• If this property is true, the user can either redundantly enter the same character as the literal at the current position, or can enter the next editable character, thereby jumping the current position to that position.

• If this property is false, the user can only enter the next editable character. If the next position in the mask will not accept the literal character (for example, the user types "/" and the next position only accepts digits), the control will raise the MaskedTextBox.MaskInputRejected event.

As an example, in the "90/90/0000" date entry mask, the forward slash characters are literals. Assume that the user has entered two initial digits, "11", so the current position in the mask is at the first forward slash (/) literal. If MaskedTextBox.SkipLiterals is true, then the user has the following valid choices:

• The user can enter a "/" character. This results in the position being moved to the next character, which in this example is the fourth position, a 9 masking element.

• The user can enter the next editable character, which in this example is a digit. The digit would be validated and the current position would automatically be moved to the fifth position, which is a 0 masking element.

If MaskedTextBox.SkipLiterals is false, then only a valid data input is allowed, which in this example would be a digit.

Namespace: System.Windows.Forms
Assembly: System.Windows.Forms (in System.Windows.Forms.dll)
Assembly Versions: 2.0.0.0