Enable the button to click on development time in Visual Studio?

Question

My setup: I have a C # application (.NET 3.5) in Visual Studio 2008. There is no chance to switch to WPF or in general :).

My application contains a custom control (a button class derived from Windows.Forms.Button) that acts as a replacement for Windows.Forms.TabControl. I can associate these buttons with each other, and each button can be associated with one control with which it deals (usually it is a kind of Windows.Forms.Panel). It looks something like this:

public class TabButton : System.Windows.Forms.Button { // ... protected override void OnClick(EventArgs e) { base.OnClick(e); this.myAssociatedControl.Visible = true; this.tellMyBuddiesToHideTheirControls(); } // ... } 

Basically, it’s just a click on a button showing its associated control, and the controls attached to the buttons associated with them disappear - like TabControl, but the approach can be easily identified and I can place the buttons far from my content panels.

Problem: This works very well at runtime, but use at development time is probably odd: use the mouse to find the control that belongs to the group and run the <Send To Back> series until the visible control appears.

Question: Is there a way to tell the VS designer to evaluate button clicks during development, how does this happen with TabControl, so that I can switch to the tabs just by clicking on them, like at runtime?

I have been looking for quite some time. There are some articles in SO, but they seem to cover the addition of additional attributes to the property constructor.

Answer 1

Edith says: Upon request, the answer to my question ...

This solution is suitable for my application. This is basically an example from msdn with some twists to make the custom constructor use the callback on click. Hope this helps anyone :-).

 [System.Security.Permissions.PermissionSet(System.Security.Permissions.SecurityAction.Demand, Name = "FullTrust")] public class TabButtonDesigner : System.Windows.Forms.Design.ControlDesigner { ShowTabGlyph myGlyph = null; Adorner myAdorner; public TabButtonDesigner() { } public override void Initialize(IComponent component) { base.Initialize(component); // Add the custom set of glyphs using the BehaviorService. // Glyphs live on adornders. myAdorner = new Adorner(); BehaviorService.Adorners.Add(myAdorner); myGlyph = new ShowTabGlyph(BehaviorService, Control); myGlyph.Callback = () => { ((MyCustomTabButton)this.Control).ShowMyTab(); }; myAdorner.Glyphs.Add(myGlyph); } class ShowTabGlyph : Glyph { Control control; BehaviorService behaviorSvc; public Action Callback { get; set; } public ShowTabGlyph(BehaviorService behaviorSvc, Control control) : base(new ShowTabBehavior()) { this.behaviorSvc = behaviorSvc; this.control = control; } public override Rectangle Bounds { get { // Create a glyph that is 10x10 and sitting // in the middle of the control. Glyph coordinates // are in adorner window coordinates, so we must map // using the behavior service. Point edge = behaviorSvc.ControlToAdornerWindow(control); Size size = control.Size; Point center = new Point(edge.X + (size.Width / 2), edge.Y + (size.Height / 2)); Rectangle bounds = new Rectangle( center.X - 5, center.Y - 5, 10, 10); return bounds; } } public override Cursor GetHitTest(Point p) { // GetHitTest is called to see if the point is // within this glyph. This gives us a chance to decide // what cursor to show. Returning null from here means // the mouse pointer is not currently inside of the glyph. // Returning a valid cursor here indicates the pointer is // inside the glyph, and also enables our Behavior property // as the active behavior. if (Bounds.Contains(p)) { return Cursors.Hand; } return null; } public override void Paint(PaintEventArgs pe) { // Draw our glyph. It is simply a blue ellipse. pe.Graphics.DrawEllipse(Pens.Blue, Bounds); } // By providing our own behavior we can do something interesting // when the user clicks or manipulates our glyph. class ShowTabBehavior : Behavior { public override bool OnMouseUp(Glyph g, MouseButtons button) { //MessageBox.Show("Hey, you clicked the mouse here"); //this. ShowTabGlyph myG = (ShowTabGlyph)g; if (myG.Callback != null) { myG.Callback(); } return true; // indicating we processed this event. } } } } [DesignerAttribute(typeof(TabButtonDesigner))] public class MyCustomTabButton : System.Windows.Forms.Button { // The attribute will assign the custom designer to the TabButton // and after a rebuild the button contains a centered blue circle // that acts at design time like the button in runtime does ... // ... }