How to watermark a dropdownlist in asp.net

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Does anyone know how to watermark a dropdown list so that I can indicate "Select a Name" as the shown value but not have it post to the database as a selection.

I have tried using an item with no value but it keeps coming up with a value anyway, Any time I update my page it always puts a value there. So I add a blank item for the first choice but I want a Select Name there.

What I have tried:

Tried the DropdownList values.

Posted 26-Feb-16 10:06am

Member 11598884

Updated 26-Feb-16 12:29pm

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Dave Kreskowiak · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-26T12:29:00

That's not a watermark. It's a "placeholder". ASP.NET controls are not some special thing that browsers handle. ASP.NET markup, <asp... tags, just tell the view engine to emit normal HTML.

Now, there is no standard way of adding a placeholder to a dropdown list. It's just not in the HTML spec. You can fake it, but it's not going to work how you're probably imagining it. On top of that, placeholder support isn't standard across all browsers or browser versions.

You can find an example here[^]. You're probably going to have to do some fudging in ASP.NET to emit the correct HTML, like this[^].