Return text in an alternative form

Couple of options.

1: You can use a Label, and as part of the configuration there is the "Output Format" which you can put a macro (using {% Value %} as the value of it), so you would have to write a macro to get it:

SiteObjects.Forms.Where("FormID = "+convert.ToInt(Value, 0))[0]["CodeName"]

2: Keep it a Drop Down list, just use a macro to 'enable' or 'disable' it based on if !string.isnullorwhitespace(TheDropDownFieldName.Value). This will show a drop down that can't be changed with the value set to the one in the database.

As far as I understand you probably want to show to a returning user his previous answer in order to avoid him answering twice the same question. For example if a user has selected his category from drop down - no need to answer again.

In your form data you have to have a field that a connects form record to your current user For example let it be email and you want to get CategoryID - your macro should be

{%SiteObjects.Forms["YourFormCodeName"].Items.Where("email='" + CurrentUser.Email + "'").FirstItem.CategoryId|(identity)GlobalAdministrator%}

Now you can set selected item using jquery and disable the dropdown.:)

P.S. You can get the text instead of value, but you need to create a custom macro, because you need to run your query.

When you use label to present some value it gives you an option to select transformation for your data, e.g. Yes/No transformation for bool values, User name from user ID, etc. You could implement your custom transformation to convert key to a value. Here is documentation on UniGrid transformations.

Another option would be custom macro.

P.S. In case you are going to present multiple items it is recommended to cache all key/value pairs, so you do not query SQL server for each item.