changing theme of C# windows application - themes

in ASP we have so many ways to change theme .
but is there any way for chanigngthe whole theme of a windows application/?

By default a winform app will inherit windows theme but you can explicitly change some ui properties like color,font etc.
You can also consider moving to WPF for better and easy to implement UI.

Nope, at least not easily.
But you could give WPF a try, you will need to upgrade to C# 3.0 for that.

Some 3rd party component sets support theming.
Example : Developer express

Related

Xamarin Forms Dropdown Menu

I am new to Xamarin and I was wondering if it is possible in Xamarin Forms to create a menu similar to this:
.
It looks like you are trying to do a SlideOver menu which I would suggest using SlideOverKit
They support some nice menu options which you can adapt with and is easily implementable by using their nuget package.
Yes. It is possible. I recommend you have a look at Custom renderers. They enable you to do whatever the executing platform is capable of. Note that depending on what you need there may be plenty of platform knowledge that is needed.
I would suggest using SyncFusion component called DataGrid. SyncFusion has many great components for Xamarin forms. They also have a community license were you can get all components for free if you are qualified.
you can use this list in your custom master detail or menu component.

Windows Visual Themes: Gallery of Parts and States?

Microsoft Windows lets programmers draw GUI elements using the look and feel of the current theme using functions like DrawThemeBackground and DrawThemeText. The elements are specified by Class, Part, and State, as described at the Parts and States page at MSDN.
Unfortunately, the page is not very informative (at all!). So the question is: is there somewhere a reference of all these parts and states, preferably with images of the elements (in the default Windows Vista/7 theme)?
I have created a small Windows application, programmed with the table at Parts and States. This application lets the programmer browse and explore all parts and states, using the current OS theme.
(High-Res)
It can be downloaded at
https://privat.rejbrand.se/UxExplore.exe
The (Delphi, Win32 API) source, which is too long to be posted here (due to hundreds of constants) is found at
https://privat.rejbrand.se/UxExplore.zip
https://privat.rejbrand.se/UxExploreMain.html
https://privat.rejbrand.se/UxExploreConsts.html
You're looking for this.
Mike Lische, who wrote the first Theme support for Delphi (which was later absorbed by Borland) has a very good Theme Explorer demo application:
It's not been updated to support new Windows 7 common controls, but its parts/states explorer is very pretty.
And if i may say, Andreas, a design you might want to copy for yours :)
Much more comprehensive theme explorer: mCtrl Theme Explorer

Can I create a Visual Studio 2010 Add-In that Uses a WPF Display?

We're working on creating a specialized graphical editor for our enterprise applications. We've looked at and rejected DSLs. Ideally I'd like to have the main interface of the editor be docked like the code windows and use WPF for drawing. Can anyone point me to some documentation to get me on the right path?
Thanks.
Colin.
UPDATE: It's beginning to look like "no." From http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb166228.aspx: "Document windows are created by implementing an editor. The IVsEditorFactory interface creates document windows as part of instantiating an editor. For more information, see Accessing the Editor By Using Legacy Interfaces."
Following the link to http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd885127.aspx gives this this bit of advice: "You can access the Visual Studio editor from legacy interfaces. The Visual Studio SDK includes adapters known as shims, which enable these interfaces to interact with the new editor. Nevertheless, we recommend that you update your legacy code to use the new editor API. Your code will perform better and you can use new technologies such as the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and the Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF)."
So, to sum up: if you want to implement an editor you have to use the legacy interfaces, but you shouldn't use the legacy interfaces because then you can't use WPF or MEF.
Seriously Microsoft, WTF?
UPDATE 2: Now that I have the proper names ("custom editor"), I was able to find the following topic: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vsxprerelease/thread/9e605d0f-1296-47c9-a534-e54905251ebe
I still don't see why they couldn't have included that somewhere prominent in the MSDN docs. You know, like somewhere near where they tell you that you can't use WPF if you're using the legacy interfaces.
Creating a custom editor doesn't have to be terribly painful. Yes, a custom editor will require implementing a few interfaces, but you can still use WPF to actually create the control that is hosted in the VS document frame.
DiveDeeper's blog has some great resources for learning about creating a custom editor.
Creating a simple custom editor - the basics
Creating a simple custom editor - the first 10 meters
Creating a simple custom editor - under pressure
I'd recommend using a library like VSXtra to do a lot of the work for you. It will provide you with a nice base implementation of an editor factory, editor pane, package, etc. Istvan Novak writes about building a custom editor with his VSXtra library in this blog post.

Effel: EiffelVision2 changing widget style

I'm joining an Eiffel project that has a horribly outdated GUI design. The GUI is built with EiffelVision2 and the application is Windows platform only.
how can I change the look/design of the widgets, like defining shape and color of scrollbars, buttons, window borders and so on?
thank you!
I think this can be done using manifest file.
For instance, https://svn.eiffel.com/eiffelstudio/trunk/Src/Eiffel/Ace/ec.exe.manifest allows EiffelStudio to have nicer look than default classic theme.
You can check similar question/answers from http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/eiffel_software/message/8791

Designing Panels without a parent Form in VS?

Are there any tools or plugins to design a Panel independently of a Form (Windows, not Web Form) within Visual Studio?
I've been using the designer and manually extracting the bits I want from the source, but surely there is a nicer way.
You could do all the design work inside of a UserControl.
If you go that route, instead of just copying the bits out of the user control, simply use the user control itself.
You could just write the code by hand!
As Chris Karcher said, you should probably use a user control. This will allow easy, VS-supported/-integrated reuse without having to manually fiddle with designer code.

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