A slightly better WinForms wizard, and slightly more work.

re: A slightly better WinForms wizard, and slightly more work.

Nick Codignotto — Thu, 05 Aug 2004 14:57:00 GMT

Hi!

I took your code and all I did was change all instances of "Panel" to "Control". I had to add a parameterless ctor() to my designer-friendly Control-derived class, but now I can design "panels" (controls, really) in the designer and create a wizard with ease.

I even created a WizardPanelBase so my Wizard panels (controls, really... I have to come up with better names), look like this using partial classes in C# 2.0:

public partial class WelcomePanel : WizardPanelBase
{
public WelcomePanel() : base()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
}

re: A slightly better WinForms wizard, and slightly more work.

Justin Rogers — Wed, 14 Apr 2004 01:49:00 GMT

Yep, with the current framework there isn't any reason you can't use Inherited Controls (to inherit from Panel). Not having time to test how easy this would be I chose not to throw it out there.

Since people really want designability, I'll mark that as my next article and talk about how to make this framework truly designable. Perhaps using UserControl's, perhaps using some other feature.

re: A slightly better WinForms wizard, and slightly more work.

Roger Heim — Wed, 14 Apr 2004 01:34:00 GMT

Wouldn't UserControls give you the best of both worlds? You would get the benefit of designability and avoid the problem with forms being closed.

re: A slightly better WinForms wizard, and slightly more work.

Justin Rogers — Tue, 13 Apr 2004 20:37:00 GMT

I was hoping someone would point this out. Form navigation does have the benefit of being designable, but at a pretty large cost. The size, location, and navigation UI all have to be replicated in some form or another. Of course you could use the reverse theme that each panel support a UI root where the navigation could be tossed into.

The biggest issue with form wizards is that you lose the forms on the back-end if the get closed. You see, it is easy to Close a form. They provide UI for it even. However, it isn't easy to Close a panel and so you are pretty much ensured that your panel with the controls that contain your data will be there.

That brings us back to designability. The only true designability would be to implement our own designer. That is for both Wizard Forms and the Panels. That might be something I get to in the article series. Another option is to write generic layout code that follows the design guidelines from MS for wizards and dialogs. Not even the WinForms designer does this for you, with it's goofy grid system. You'd have to manually type the stuff in or be a diligent drag and drop artist.

I think this layout designer might be just what is needed for the panels. As for the Form, you can design that in VS (I'll pop out a better version for the 4th article) if you'd like.

re: A slightly better WinForms wizard, and slightly more work.

Shane O'Dell — Tue, 13 Apr 2004 18:42:00 GMT

One thing about adding panel navigation instead of a series of forms is that I don't see a good way to use the VS Designer to create the different panels. Any thoughts on this?

Developing a Windows Forms Wizard...

TrackBack — Mon, 12 Apr 2004 02:28:00 GMT