I have two forms. On the first form I have a virtual numpad (I have a GroupBox and inside I have number buttons and this is my virtual numpad). With this virtual numpad I enter numbers into a TextBox. On the second form I have another TextBox where I enter numbers.
I want to use my virtual numpad on this second form. How can I do that?
If someone explained to me what I should do, step by step, I will be pleased.
1) Create a WinForms project, I called it "ReusingUserControlsSample"
2) Create a new UserControl, name it MyUserControlWithButtons or whatever else you like
3) Just out of habit, set "AutoSize=true" and AutoSizeMode="GrowAndShrink" on the UserControl properties. Later you may learn what they do
4) On the UserControlDesigner place some button on the control, name them "btnLetterA", "btnLetterB", "btnLetterC"
5) Double click on each of the buttons, so the click-handlers will be generated
6) In your UserControl's code, make a public TextBox TheOutput property
7) In your UserControl's code, in each of the click-handlers you've generated in step (5), add a line that adds some text to the TheOutput textbox's TextBox property. Remeber to check the TheOutput for NULL.
BUILD.
8) go back to Form1
9) Place MyUserControlWithButtons on the form, name it "mykeyboard"
10) Place a TextBox on the form, name it "mytextbox"
11) Go to the Form1's code
12) in te constructor, BELOW the "InitializeComponent", asign the mytextbox to the TheOutput of mykeyboard
And this is it. Now you can build it and run, and everything should be OK. Please not that whole code of the 'keyboard' is in the usercontrol. The form only has set it up to work with that textbox. On the second form you can do it in the same way: place keyboard, place textbox, setup the keyboard to write to that textbox and it will work the same.
The Code:
MyUserControlWithButtons.cs
using System;
using System.Windows.Forms;
namespace ReusingUserControlsSample
{
public partial class MyUserControlWithButtons : UserControl
{
public MyUserControlWithButtons()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
public TextBox TheOutput { get; set; }
private void btnLetterA_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
TheOutput.Text += "A";
}
private void btnLetterB_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
TheOutput.Text += "B";
}
private void btnLetterC_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
TheOutput.Text += "C";
}
}
}
MyUserControlWithButtons.cs
namespace ReusingUserControlsSample
{
partial class MyUserControlWithButtons
{
/// <summary>
/// Required designer variable.
/// </summary>
private System.ComponentModel.IContainer components = null;
/// <summary>
/// Clean up any resources being used.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="disposing">true if managed resources should be disposed; otherwise, false.</param>
protected override void Dispose(bool disposing)
{
if (disposing && (components != null))
{
components.Dispose();
}
base.Dispose(disposing);
}
#region Component Designer generated code
/// <summary>
/// Required method for Designer support - do not modify
/// the contents of this method with the code editor.
/// </summary>
private void InitializeComponent()
{
this.btnLetterA = new System.Windows.Forms.Button();
this.btnLetterB = new System.Windows.Forms.Button();
this.btnLetterC = new System.Windows.Forms.Button();
this.SuspendLayout();
//
// btnLetterA
//
this.btnLetterA.Location = new System.Drawing.Point(3, 3);
this.btnLetterA.Name = "btnLetterA";
this.btnLetterA.Size = new System.Drawing.Size(66, 21);
this.btnLetterA.TabIndex = 0;
this.btnLetterA.Text = "The \"A\"";
this.btnLetterA.UseVisualStyleBackColor = true;
this.btnLetterA.Click += new System.EventHandler(this.btnLetterA_Click);
//
// btnLetterB
//
this.btnLetterB.Location = new System.Drawing.Point(66, 30);
this.btnLetterB.Name = "btnLetterB";
this.btnLetterB.Size = new System.Drawing.Size(66, 21);
this.btnLetterB.TabIndex = 0;
this.btnLetterB.Text = "The \"B\"";
this.btnLetterB.UseVisualStyleBackColor = true;
this.btnLetterB.Click += new System.EventHandler(this.btnLetterB_Click);
//
// btnLetterC
//
this.btnLetterC.Location = new System.Drawing.Point(3, 57);
this.btnLetterC.Name = "btnLetterC";
this.btnLetterC.Size = new System.Drawing.Size(66, 21);
this.btnLetterC.TabIndex = 0;
this.btnLetterC.Text = "The \"C\"";
this.btnLetterC.UseVisualStyleBackColor = true;
this.btnLetterC.Click += new System.EventHandler(this.btnLetterC_Click);
//
// MyUserControlWithButtons
//
this.AutoScaleDimensions = new System.Drawing.SizeF(6F, 13F);
this.AutoScaleMode = System.Windows.Forms.AutoScaleMode.Font;
this.AutoSize = true;
this.AutoSizeMode = System.Windows.Forms.AutoSizeMode.GrowAndShrink;
this.Controls.Add(this.btnLetterC);
this.Controls.Add(this.btnLetterB);
this.Controls.Add(this.btnLetterA);
this.Name = "MyUserControlWithButtons";
this.Size = new System.Drawing.Size(135, 81);
this.ResumeLayout(false);
}
#endregion
private System.Windows.Forms.Button btnLetterA;
private System.Windows.Forms.Button btnLetterB;
private System.Windows.Forms.Button btnLetterC;
}
}
Form1.cs
using System.Windows.Forms;
namespace ReusingUserControlsSample
{
public partial class Form1 : Form
{
public Form1()
{
InitializeComponent();
mykeyboard.TheOutput = mytextbox;
}
}
}
Form1.Designer.cs
namespace ReusingUserControlsSample
{
partial class Form1
{
/// <summary>
/// Required designer variable.
/// </summary>
private System.ComponentModel.IContainer components = null;
/// <summary>
/// Clean up any resources being used.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="disposing">true if managed resources should be disposed; otherwise, false.</param>
protected override void Dispose(bool disposing)
{
if (disposing && (components != null))
{
components.Dispose();
}
base.Dispose(disposing);
}
#region Windows Form Designer generated code
/// <summary>
/// Required method for Designer support - do not modify
/// the contents of this method with the code editor.
/// </summary>
private void InitializeComponent()
{
this.mytextbox = new System.Windows.Forms.TextBox();
this.mykeyboard = new ReusingUserControlsSample.MyUserControlWithButtons();
this.SuspendLayout();
//
// mytextbox
//
this.mytextbox.Location = new System.Drawing.Point(84, 38);
this.mytextbox.Name = "mytextbox";
this.mytextbox.Size = new System.Drawing.Size(100, 20);
this.mytextbox.TabIndex = 0;
//
// mykeyboard
//
this.mykeyboard.AutoSize = true;
this.mykeyboard.AutoSizeMode = System.Windows.Forms.AutoSizeMode.GrowAndShrink;
this.mykeyboard.Location = new System.Drawing.Point(66, 122);
this.mykeyboard.Name = "mykeyboard";
this.mykeyboard.Size = new System.Drawing.Size(135, 81);
this.mykeyboard.TabIndex = 1;
//
// Form1
//
this.AutoScaleDimensions = new System.Drawing.SizeF(6F, 13F);
this.AutoScaleMode = System.Windows.Forms.AutoScaleMode.Font;
this.ClientSize = new System.Drawing.Size(284, 264);
this.Controls.Add(this.mykeyboard);
this.Controls.Add(this.mytextbox);
this.Name = "Form1";
this.Text = "Form1";
this.ResumeLayout(false);
this.PerformLayout();
}
#endregion
private System.Windows.Forms.TextBox mytextbox;
private MyUserControlWithButtons mykeyboard;
}
}
Program.cs
using System;
using System.Windows.Forms;
namespace ReusingUserControlsSample
{
static class Program
{
/// <summary>
/// The main entry point for the application.
/// </summary>
[STAThread]
static void Main()
{
Application.EnableVisualStyles();
Application.SetCompatibleTextRenderingDefault(false);
Application.Run(new Form1());
}
}
}
Create a UserControl and place your virtual number pad groupbox/buttons on that. Then plce your new usercontrol on each form in place of the existing groupbox/buttons.
You have two options:
either create a UserControl named "VirtualKeypad", and move your GroupBox and keypad buttons there, and then use(place) the new "VirtualKeypad" control on both of the forms,. Your control would have to expose some events, or have a property that would tell it which textbox to put the text at, etc..
or, if you want to have only one keypad, your are in trouble. The keypad must be one, but how your keypad buttons will know where to place the text entered? You will have to listen to focus changes, so that when you click/touch a textbox (first or second), and then click/touch the keypad, the keypad will have to check who had the focus before him (was the old focus on textbox first or second) and then put the digit/letter there. It will a little tricky to do.. Also, if you are a beginner in WinForms, you may have some problems with communication between two separate windows. I'd recommend you try with the UserControl first.
I would recommend just copying it over (preferably by copying it all into a new usercontrol, like Dan-o said, then just placing on on each form), and then swapping which is visible. To directly answer your question, though, you can move controls between forms by just modifying their Controls collection:
//FormA
FormB formBInstance;
void button_OnClick(object sender, EventArgs e){
Controls.Remove(myControl);
formBInstance.Controls.Add(myControl);
}
But then you have the implicit difficulties of managing which form it's on at any given time and I'd recommend you never cross controls between forms like this unless you really need to (and if you think you do, there's normally an easier way).
Since you asked step-by-step, which no-one here can really do, heres an explaination of user controls which should help. After that, just select it from your toolbox like you would any other control and make on on each form. (and if you really need them to behave 'as one', setup something to toggle which is visible).
That was the way! It didnt worked because the buttons were just sitting there and you've propably not written any code to handle the clicks in the new control. You have to move WHOLE groupbox/buttons to the control, all along WHOLE code that handles it: all eventhandlers, all formatters, etc, everything you did on the first form to have the keypad working - now must be moved to the UserControl.
But this is not end! Your keypad-handling code, when a button click occurs, adds a text to the textbox, right? Now, in your usercontrol, there will be no textbox.
Your new beautiful control has to abstract from the textbox. Ideally, it should assume that there will be any textbox at all, but lets skip that. In the code of your new usercontrol, place a new property similar to public TextBox MyOutputTextbox {get;set}. Now, lets act that property this is your textbox that will get all the text and fix your UserControl code accordingly. Then place your Control on the forms. Then make sure that BOTH of your Form's constructor ASSIGN the textbox to that property:
public Form1() {
InitializeComponent();
myKeyPadControl.MyOutputTextbox = txtFirstBox;
}
and it should work.