R – how to work with multiple coincident panel controls in VS 2008 windows forms

netvisual studiowinforms

in VS 2008, I am attempting to design a windows form that is similar to a set of property pages but uses a TreeView to select the page rather than a TabControl. An example of this design is the Options dialog in VS 2008 itself. There are two reasons I want to do this: 1. I prefer the look and feel; 2. I want to give users the ability to add child nodes to the TreeView.

I am using multiple Panel controls to contain the controls for each "property page". These panels will all be coincident on the form, i.e. overlapping each other. I am finding that the VS UI designer is not very user-friendly when I do this; I can select each panel easily enough, but all the controls inside the panel are visible at the same time, leading to a jumbled mess. Working with a TabControl is much easier, as you can select a tab and only see the controls that you've placed onto that tab.

Is there a different approach that will make this easier for me, or do I have to make do with a TabControl? TIA

Best Answer

In order to get behavior similar to the TabControl where each tab gives you a different designer canvas on which to place controls, you will need to write a designer for your control that provides the tabbing interaction when in the Forms designer. However, if you want to avoid this, you could take the approach we use in a similar situation and make each tab page its own UserControl, then add them as tabs in the constructor of your main tabbed control.

This allows you to design each tab individually, avoiding the overlapping issue you currently face.

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R – How to handle stacked controls in .NET Winforms

You can hide the tabs, very convenient in the designer. Add a new class to your project and paste this code:

using System;
using System.Windows.Forms;

public class TablessControl : TabControl {
  protected override void WndProc(ref Message m) {
    // Hide tabs by trapping the TCM_ADJUSTRECT message
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    else base.WndProc(ref m);
  }
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C# – How to save application settings in a Windows Forms application

If you work with Visual Studio then it is pretty easy to get persistable settings. Right click on the project in Solution Explorer and choose Properties. Select the Settings tab and click on the hyperlink if settings doesn't exist.

Use the Settings tab to create application settings. Visual Studio creates the files Settings.settings and Settings.Designer.settings that contain the singleton class Settings inherited from ApplicationSettingsBase. You can access this class from your code to read/write application settings:

Properties.Settings.Default["SomeProperty"] = "Some Value";
Properties.Settings.Default.Save(); // Saves settings in application configuration file

This technique is applicable both for console, Windows Forms, and other project types.

Note that you need to set the scope property of your settings. If you select Application scope then Settings.Default.<your property> will be read-only.

Reference: How To: Write User Settings at Run Time with C# - Microsoft Docs

Best Answer

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R – How to handle stacked controls in .NET Winforms

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