DevComponents Knowledge Base

If you wish to use Ctrl+Tab key to move through the document dock tabs on active Bar control add following code to your form to enable that: C# protected override bool ProcessCmdKey(ref Message msg, Keys keyData) { // Detect the keys pressed and ensure that there is an active control   if ((keyData & Keys.Tab) [...]

To display the list of the bars on the popup menu you can use DotNetBarManager.ExpandedChange event to dynamically add/remove ButtonItem objects that describe the bars. Sample attached below is modified DockableWindows sample that shows how to do that. Note that under Bars menu item there is a place holder item which is just a dummy [...]

When using Document Docking DotNetBar functionality usually there is a need to find out the Bar control that has input focus, for example if you are hosting edit controls. To do that you would use standard Windows Forms methods. For example following function can be used to get the active bar: C# private Bar GetActiveBar() [...]

Samples below demonstrates how to popup DotNetBar menu when using NotifyIcon control. If you are using VS.NET 2005 download NotifyIconPopupMenuVS2005.zip project. Here is relevant code that shows menu from NotifyIcon: C# Point p = Control.MousePosition; Size popupSize = popup1.PopupSize();   // Calculate position properly taking in account the popup height and width   p.Offset(-popupSize.Width, -popupSize.Height); [...]

Following code can be used in Form Load event to save default layout to a string: C# private void SaveDefaultLayout() { ArrayList customBars = new ArrayList();   foreach (Bar bar in dotNetBarManager1.Bars) { if (!bar.CustomBar) { bar.CustomBar = true;   customBars.Add(bar); } }   m_DefaultLayout = dotNetBarManager1.LayoutDefinition;   foreach (Bar bar in customBars) bar.CustomBar = [...]

Sample application below shows how to change the ColorScheme on context menus or other popup menus where parent is not on a bar. In essence handle the DotNetBarManager.PopUpShowing event. In event handler cast the sender to PopupItem and check the name of it to make sure it is your context menu. Then access the PopupItem.PopupControl [...]

Tearing off the DockContainerItem from the Bar control involves following steps: Remove DockContainerItem from its current Bar Create new Bar to host the DockContainerItem Add DockContainerItem to the newly created Bar control Add Bar control to the DotNetBarManager Float or Dock the Bar // Remove DockContainerItem from its current parent   Bar previousParent = dockContainerItem1.ContainerControl [...]

When bar is floating it is hosted on a floating container which is simply an instance of System.Windows.Forms.Form object. The floating container is owned by the form that bar is placed on and that is the reason it is always displayed on top of that form. To make the floating bars behave just like any [...]

Applies to DotNetBar 5.9 or older only. Issue: Loading DotNetBarManager definition files at run-time shows hidden MDI Child forms. Resolution: Hidden MDI Child forms in 1.0 and 1.1 .NET Framework have number of problems including this one. The problem is not with DotNetBar rather with .NET Framework. Accessing Form.Handle property will cause hidden MDI Child [...]

DotNetBar System text refers to the text displayed on Customize Dialog, Add/Remove Items menu etc. DotNetBarManager provides built in translation for many system text used in German, Italian, Spanish, French, Japanese, Korean, Chinese and Swedish. Localization of system text used by DotNetBar is done using DotNetBarManager.LocalizeString event. In this event handler you set the LocalizedValue [...]