Placeholder still visible when adding edit control to a CToolbar? - visual-studio

Question

Years ago, I added an edit control to the toolbar in my application following directions similar to these:
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/1106/Adding-a-Combo-Box-to-a-Docking-Toolbar
Similar directions can be found in many articles, so I think the procedure is fairly common. Until a few years ago, this worked fine, and the result was as shown in the article. However, I believe the move to XP changed the appearance of buttons in the toolbar, and instead I now see this in my application:
It seems as though the original instructions worked only because controls prior to the change occupied the entire height of the toolbar, so the edit control obstructed the separator behind it.
Ideally, I think the underlying separator should be made invisible. However, this doesn't seem to be handled explicitly in any of the articles I've found, and I'm not quite sure myself how to prevent the separator from being drawn.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Answer 1

If you follow that article on codeproject exactly, you have probably modified the place holder into a separator from a button. This is why the separator line shown thru when the height of the button image is bigger than the height of the combo box.
If you keep the place holder as an empty button, you will not have such problem. A series of several place holder buttons may be needed in cascaded formation for a really useful length for the combobox.
This technique is demonstrated as follows:
// standard creation of the toolbar in CMainFrame::OnCreate
if (!m_wndToolBar.CreateEx(this, TBSTYLE_FLAT, WS_CHILD | WS_VISIBLE | CBRS_TOP
| CBRS_GRIPPER | CBRS_TOOLTIPS | CBRS_FLYBY | CBRS_SIZE_DYNAMIC) ||
!m_wndToolBar.LoadToolBar(IDR_MAINFRAME))
{
TRACE0("Failed to create toolbar\n");
return -1; // fail to create
}
// status bar creation .....
// .....
// the place holders are a series of 5 empty toolbar buttons ie: ID_COMBO_1 to ID_COMBO_5
// get index of first combobox place holder
INT nIndex = m_wndToolBar.GetToolBarCtrl().CommandToIndex(ID_COMBO_1);
// get size of first place holder rectangle
CRect rcRect;
m_wndToolBar.GetToolBarCtrl().GetItemRect(nIndex, &rcRect);
INT nWidth = rcRect.Width();
// calculate width of combobox with sum of all place holder (5 in total)
nWidth = nWidth * 5;
rcRect.top = 5; // top of combo box
rcRect.bottom = rcRect.top + 250; // drop height
rcRect.right = rcRect.left + nWidth;
// create the combobox to sit above the place holders
if(!m_comboBox.Create(CBS_DROPDOWNLIST | CBS_SORT | WS_VISIBLE |
WS_TABSTOP | WS_VSCROLL, rcRect, &m_wndToolBar, ID_COMBO_1))
{
TRACE(_T("Failed to create combo-box\n"));
return FALSE;
}
m_comboBox.AddString("Toolbar Combobox item one");
m_comboBox.AddString("Toolbar Combobox item two");
m_comboBox.AddString("Toolbar Combobox item three");

Answer 2

I've used this technique from CodeGuru. It's old, but, I've been using it for many years and it still works.