I'm looking to custom draw a progress indicator in a listView using standard win32 features, at the minute I can from the NM_CUSTOMDRAW message set a background colour for either 0% or 100% and let windows deal with it or return CDRF_SKIPDEFAULT where I assume I can just fill a portion of the rectangle with colour depending on the % then draw the text on top giving a very basic progress meter but looking here there is some really neat effects so I'm wondering if I can achieve anything like that from the basic winapi?
Found an example here that shows how to do this with the default Windows functions.
Related
I have seen a program recently that has got what appears to be a custom Window border.
I don't know how this is accomplished. If anyone does know then please do tell me as this is interesting.
I am mostly interested in something similar shown in the picture
Window example of what I am trying to accomplish
You must handle the non-client messages like WM_NCPAINT. Depending on your design you might need to call DwmDefWindowProc as well.
Use SetWindowRgn if you want XP style rounded edges or SetLayeredWindowAttributes for full alpha support and custom shadows.
I made a flyout window in the notification area using WinAPI and my goal was to make it similar to the flyout windows that show up when you click some of the icons in the notification area, like the Volume icon.
I already succeeded in making it look and behave similar to the other ones, but there is one thing I can't seem to figure out. The link area of the flyout windows has a darker blueish background and there is a subtle difference in the look between Windows 7 and Windows 8. A picture of it in Windows 7 can be seen here
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa511448.aspx#flyouts
I achieved this by painting this link area of my flyout window manually in the right colors (including the gradient at the topmost part of the section) using the WM_PAINT message, but I just feel like it's too much of a hack, especially because it's not affected by changing themes in Windows. For example, if I set the "Windows Classic" theme this area should be grey and not blue.
So, my question is, am I missing something in how this can be achieved without painting the window manually. I noticed that the details pane in Explorer windows in Win 7 has the same look. I've searched quite a bit for answers but I haven't found anything yet. This is my first time doing a GUI using the WinAPI so I have very little experience, and therefore I'm assuming there is something that I just don't know about.
UPDATE:
I did manage to figure out how to draw this area without painting it manually. It can be drawn by using the OpenThemeData and DrawThemeBackground functions
HTHEME aeroTheme = OpenThemeData(hWnd, L"FLYOUT");
DrawThemeBackground(aeroTheme, hdc, FLYOUT_LINKAREA, 0, &rect, &rect);
This obviously only works when themes are enabled, so for non-themed cases I draw a normal rectangle with the appropriate color.
I'm not an expert in WinAPI so I can't offer any advice on achieving the look you want without manual painting.
However, if you're successfully achieving the appearance for a particular color theme, I'd suggest you look at the GetSysColor function and use this when creating your brushes for painting. This should allow you to get the correct colors based on the theme that has been set. More info (including a swatch table) can be found here.
Hope this helps.
with windows phone 7 i am using teh bing map control. i have it working just fine. however, the zoom buttons (+,-) are at the bottom of the page and difficult to see.
The buttons have black border with black text. They are easy to see on a light map background, but with black background they are in essence hidden.
Does anyone have an idea on how to make them easier to see?
As invalidusername said you can use the pinching to zoom in and out and it is probably a better way to do it. But in my case I haven't a device or touch screen so needed to use buttons in this way to test my map.
Rather than using the built-in zoom buttons I looked at the sample code from this tutorial which has icons for zoom in/out and data bound them to the zooming of the map. Adapting it to my needs. It works pretty well:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/wp7trainingcourse_usingbingmapslab_topic2
You can change the positioning/images etc.
As per DanielBallinger's comment the link above seems to no longer work. The following does:
Bing Maps Tutorial
I'm trying to get the media player glass effect for an application, but I'm facing roadblocks all around. Is it me, or is it the API?
I started by calling:
MARGINS margins = { -1, -1, -1, -1 };
HRESULT result = ::DwmExtendFrameIntoClientArea(m_hWnd, &margins);
And erasing the background to black on:
OnEraseBkgnd
Everything was fine until I added an edit box. With EditBox, places where black text appears are replaced with glass. The problem is blown out of proportion with more advanced controls like ComboBoxEx and that like. Those start to look like mess.
The bright side with this approach is that the alpha blended images look alright. And are gradually blended into the glass.
The solution for edit boxes seems to be using WS_EX_LAYERED with LWA_COLORKEY and using some awful color for glass masking, and erasing the background to that color. Unfortunately this breaks other things. The alpha blending on icons looks super ugly with shadows blended to radioactive green, and the glass itself becomes click-throughable, even though I don't have a WS_EX_TRANSPARENT style on the window.
The third suggestion is sort of custom composition with GDI+, but that seems to be a bad approach, since GDI+ is a software fallback, and I can't find a way how to render EditBox or ComboBoxEx to an image that I could use for composition later.
Am I missing something?
The sources at SO also seem to face the same problems:
link1
link2
Kenny Kerr wrote an excellent article on displaying controls on glass, using edit controls as an example:
http://weblogs.asp.net/kennykerr/archive/2007/01/23/controls-and-the-desktop-window-manager.aspx
The simple answer is, you cannot do this.
All the standard controls render themselves with normal GDI calls. Normal GDI calls are alpha unaware and mostly set the alpha channel to zero.
The more complicated answer is, you can: There are some samples on the net where standard controls are mixed with aero glass. They fall into two basic categories:
WinForms (.NET) samples. WinForms don't actually use the native controls - the WinForms controls are all rewritten versions that, amongst other features, blit using alpha aware routines. This example is depressingly simple and makes me realize how much Microsoft hate native developers.
Subclassed samples: The only way to get the regular/native controls to paint on aero glass is to sublclass the controls, catch WM_PAINT messages to create a DIBBitmap, call WM_PRINT to render the controls content onto it. Use the DWM functions to repair the alpha channel data. Paint the resulting alpha'd bitap yourself using AlphaBlend.
This article on CodeProject contains a reference implementation that subclasses most of the standard controls rather well.
Try changing your text/foreground color on controls like the edit box to something "almost black" (like #010101). Then you should be able to skip the other rendering issues except alpha transparency for images/icons.
Edit: Drawing other stuff - might be some weird approaches to handle compatibility, but then again classic apps aren't glass themed by default ... don't know. Just try to avoid drawing stuff yourself, if possible.
I'm using a VB6 PictureBox on my User Control. I set the PictureBox's picture, I set the BorderStyle to 0, and I set the BackColor to the User Control's BackColor. The idea is that I want a "floating" icon. However, I want that icon to appear clickable when the mouse hovers over it.
Two questions:
Which events do I use? MouseMove seems to be the closest to a "MouseOver" event. Are there any cleaner alternatives?
How should I change the style? I've tried a few things, but none of them quite look right.
MouseMove is the correct event in VB6. You'll have to do some work to manually detect when the mouse leaves the client area cleanly. (My experiments in this world, lo those many years ago, always found implementing this behavior to be tricky.)
For changing the style, I'd recommend using GDI to: (a) shift the image one pixel up and to the left; (b) draw a single pixel line in the ButtonHighlightColor along the top and left edges; and (c) draw a single pixel line in the ButtonShadowColor along the bottom and right edges. This is trickier than it sounds, particularly in VB6, so ultimately I'd recommend ...
That you look at vbAccelerator's toolbar controls. They're free, and they'll probably get you most of where you want to be. (And yes, they're "classic" VB -- that is, VB6.)