Designing a Form

Hello!

I am stuck with a app. It has so many fields and i am not good at designing forms..! But i need this app. to be look professional. So i want to know weather are there any standards which are adapted while designing a form ?

Thanks!

I think it looks alot better to use the "Align To Grid" menu item on objects. This 'snaps' them to the dotted gridlines you see on the form when designing (by slightly changing their height and width properties). Also, I find using some nice graphics on Toolbar buttons and even sometimes on normal command buttons work well :)

Phreak

Hi!

Thanks for the reply but i meant like are'nt there any standards ? Like how MS designs their apps. ? What they keep in mind when designing the apps. ? What standards they have when designing the app. ?

Like how much space should be there between 2 text boxes ?! so the app looks great and customer also likes working on it.

Thanks!

Professional form? Hmm... what does a professional form look like? The first thing that comes into my mind is that use as few objects as you can. Another thing: group objects (visually) that are related to each other in some way. Also, don't place objects too randomly on a form. What I mean is this:

[code]
[TEXTBOX .....] [...BUTTON...]
[TEXTBOX ..] [BUTTON]
[TEXTBOX ......] [.....BUTTON.....]
[/Highlight]

When you could:

Code:

---

[TEXTBOX ...] [BUTTON]
[TEXTBOX ...] [BUTTON]
[TEXTBOX ...] [BUTTON]

---

Or even:

Code:

---

[....COMBOBOX....]
[TEXTBOX] [BUTTON]

---

Where combobox changes what is to be changed. And to make it userfriendlier, you could make even so that pressing enter saves the current value that is being edited and then next item is shown from the combobox for edit.

Humm... that's most I can figure out for now. I've seen too many ugly forms, but I can't remember all of the things that are "wrong" about them.


Edit Something more came in to my mind: you can use frames to place stuff inside them. This sometimes makes a nice look to the form, it depends of a project.

And as for the space between two textboxes, you just gotta try to trust your visual eye :D

Nope, don't think there are any standards like this. Tis up to you.
If you use a gap of say 45 twips (3 pixels) then you should use this throughout your app.
If you use command buttons like OK, Save and Cancel, then these should be the same size throughout your app, and the same gap.
Everything should use the same font too.

These are just application specific standards.
You can make these what the hell you like :D

We have a class in our app that validates a form.
You pass the form to a sub and it validates it for you and pops up messages...ie:

In a class module calles clsValidateForm

VB Code:

Option Explicit
 
Public Sub ValidateForm(ByRef pfrmForm As Form)
Dim ctlControl   As Control
   Form Each ctlControl In pfrmForm.Controls
      If TypeOf ctlControl Is CommandButton Then
         ValidateButton ctlControl
      End If
   Next ctlControl
End Sub
 
Private Sub ValidateButton(ByRef pcmdButton As CommandButton)
   If pcmdButton.Width <> 1200 Or pcdmButton.Height <> 400 Then
      MsgBox pcmdButton.Name & " should be 1200 by 400 twips", vbExlamation, "Validate Form"
   End If
End Sub

Then in a module you have:

VB Code:

Public Sub ValidateForm(ByRef pfrmForm As Form)
Dim objValidate  As clsValidateForm
   Set objValidate = New clsValidateForm
   objValidate.ValidateForm pfrmForm
   Set objValidate = Nothing
End Sub

Then in your form you have:

VB Code:

Private Sub Form_Load()
   ValidateForm Me
End Sub

This means that if you break your own standards then your app warns you when you open a form.
The validate class in our app here at work is HUGE! It checks for everything. We even validate control names, to make sure developers have named them correctly.
It checks other thinks like whether labels have a transparent background etc. Tis up to you how far you take this, but it's a good idea to use something like this. This ONLY monitors your own standards you have set throughout your own app.

VB Code:

Private Sub ValidateButton(ByRef pcmdButton As CommandButton)
   If pcmdButton.Width <> 1200 Or pcdmButton.Height <> 400 Then
      MsgBox pcmdButton.Name & " should be 1200 by 400 twips", vbExlamation, "Validate Button"
   End If
   If Left$(pcmdButton, 3) <> "cmd" Then
      MsgBox pcmdButton.Name & "'s name should start with cmd", vbExlamation, "Validate Button"
   End If
End Sub

Hope this has been of some help.

Woka

Yes! Thanks they are helping! :) I also appericiate more views from more people. The more the better! :D

Regarding the layout of controls on a form...hmmm...this is up to you.
Have a look what other apps do.

I like using outlook as a standard as I think this is a well designed app.

When you have labels on a form some people left allign the text, some right allign so in some apps you see:

Code:

---

[lblUsername  ] [TextBox]
[lblAge        ] [TextBox]

---

And some you see:

Code:

---

[  lblUsername] [TextBox]
[        lblAge] [TextBox]

---

Again, there is no standard for this, apart from your own.

Woka

Hello!

Please tell me what do you think about the attached screen shot ? Can this be improved or its okay like this ?

Thanks!

There's absolutely nothing wrong with that form.

One little trick, that might help you, is to place the command buttons in a picture box.

In the attached form I have used to picture boxes with no border.
One is alligned to the bottom oif the form.
This makes it very easy to keep the posiitons of ALL your buttons, without moving them manually.

Just a tip.

Woof

The Windows Interface Guidelines — A Guide for Designing Software
PDF 2MB

Wow! :) Thanks for the Guide I will read it soon! :)

Quote:

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Originally posted by AvisSoft
Hello!

Please tell me what do you think about the attached screen shot ? Can this be improved or its okay like this ?

Thanks!

---

Most customers I have developed for absolutely HATE multiple colors on a form. You might want to stick to a 2-color scheme.

Also, custom colors look ugly if somebody happens not to use Windows default color scheme. Like, someone might have text color white and otherwise a quite dark theme... so either use Windows system colors (tooltip color might work sometimes besides default white).

I think the form posted could be better. At the moment it has too much stuff in it, even if it is quite clear. I'm not too sure on what for the form is done so I can't give a good suggestion myself. But I'm sure there is a way to make it feel lighter and yet keep all the required functionality.

I don't know about you guys, but I have been able to use the tabbed dialog stuff with success, it isn't so bad if you know how to place it, looks much better when you use a tabbed dialog for windows that are only around 1/3 the screen size, any bigger and it kind of gets messy.

EDIT: Why the hell is there an angry face on the side of this topic?

Looks good, I think (my opinion) would be to drop the [Ok] and [Cancel] buttons to the bottom right of the form and not on the side....

Quote:

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Originally posted by Wokawidget
One little trick, that might help you, is to place the command buttons in a picture box.

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Nice tip Wokadude ;)




Bruce.

hello!

thanks for all the tips etc. the form is actually i think can't be compacted due to the calculations preformed. Using tabstripi is not an option for me as it does not works becuase the user need to see the all the data at same time.

I have used different colours so the manufacturer's and suppplier details can be differentiated becuase both have same fields etc.

Now you all know that it needs calculations to be done etc. so can this form be modified now ?

Thanks!

You could place the controls inside a FRAME, and then add a frame title to tell the user what data is what...

BruveVB...I am full of useless info like that ;)

Woof

arr you beat me to it woka,

frames are so usefull when creating professional looking forms :)

Here's a new SS now what all ya think ? :bigyello:

Thanks!

Yup. Spot on.
The only thing I would do is have the buttons at the bottom of the screen.
And instead of 2 buttons I would have an OK, Cancel and Save button.
OK: Saves changes and unloads form.
Cancel: Cancels changes and unloads form.
Save: Saves changes, but leaves form open so the user can edit a field if they want to.

But that's just me.

Oh, I would also add an icon to your form title bar.
Plus, make sure all your tab stops are correct. This really annoys users if they arn't :(

Woka

Quote:

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Originally posted by AvisSoft
Here's a new SS now what all ya think ? :bigyello:

Thanks!

---

Very proffessional looking, good job.

Something I always do is: Change the border to flat, AND resize the height to fit the input - and nothing more(this is for textboxes), so in the application you have, I'd make the textboxes small enough to only cover one line, unless you actually use the multiline functionlity, in which case my advice is useless. I've often found compacting it gives that extra edge that makes it really nice =).

I agree. At a 2nd glance your txt boxes do seem a little large in height.
I size them so the white gap at the top is the same as the bottom. You'l notice that you have a massive white gap at the bottom of your txtboxes.
You'll be supprised at the amount of realestate that is released on your form when you resize and move controls.

Wooof

Hello!

I have again re-designed the form according to the tips and tricks given by all the people..please re-check. Once the form becomes good and attractive i'll then re-design all my forms like that only. Currently i am using Wizards. But i want to give the user the flexibility of adding forms quikly without using wizards. Wizards are helpful but they consume time.

Thanks!

Now I am being picky!

The buttons should go:

OK, Cancel, Apply

just to keep to MS standards.

I would probably use SAVE instead of Apply too, but that's up to you. Not a problem so long as you are consistant throughout your app.

Woka

Quote:

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Originally posted by Wokawidget
I agree. At a 2nd glance your txt boxes do seem a little large in height.
I size them so the white gap at the top is the same as the bottom. You'l notice that you have a massive white gap at the bottom of your txtboxes.
You'll be supprised at the amount of realestate that is released on your form when you resize and move controls.

Wooof

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I don't understand by the white gap...which white gap you're refering to ?

Thanks!

You have already removed the white space by making the height of your txt boxes smaller.

Woka

Oh! :)

This is a sample on how different you can go:

And here is the code so you can test how it works:

Woka - good spot on the text box height... I could "just tell" something wasn't right, but couldn't put my finger on it. Never send a gnome to do a badger's job.

Merri - while that interface looks cool and is very compact, how it for quick data entry. It looks like it would take alot or clicking around just to enter the data.

Just my $0.02 worth, take it or leave it.

TG

techgnome: basically just by pushing enter you get to the next data and save what you just did. That's why I sent the code too so you can test how it works. I'm sure it can be improved, I made it quickly in some 10-15 minutes.

Improving it... probably a possibility to use arrow keys to browse the listboxes so you can easily get back to the last one if you made a typo (at the moment the focus always goes to the textbox below a listbox).

ah, I see now. Why not a grid then?

Then the item and it's value and data entry are all right there.

TG

Because I hate using OCXs :) You could set custom tabs to the listboxes but I were too lazy to look such code for just a sample.

Quote:

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Originally posted by techgnome
Woka - good spot on the text box height... I could "just tell" something wasn't right, but couldn't put my finger on it. Never send a gnome to do a badger's job.

Merri - while that interface looks cool and is very compact, how it for quick data entry. It looks like it would take alot or clicking around just to enter the data.

Just my $0.02 worth, take it or leave it.

TG

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Hey, I was the one to spot that :p

Quote:

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Originally posted by vbNeo
Hey, I was the one to spot that :p

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My appologies.


I really need to get my eyes checked.... maybe I just need a memory upgrade.

TG :blush:

Damn it! I was taking all the credit there!

I now have nothing...*sulk*

Sad Woka :(

Hi Merri!

Thanks for the new layout it looks great! :) I'll check it out soon and let you know the results.

Thanks everyone else for their valuable tips and tricks!

I love creating interfaces...

I first kind of sketch them out..then figure out what images I may need. I have even integrated Macromedia flash into vb...

Comes out pretty good...
Check em out:

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/20.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/21.JPG

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.vbforums.com/

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/16.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/17.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/18.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/19.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/22.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/23.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/24.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/25.JPG

http://www.jakrauseinc.com/jhermiz/26.JPG
:afrog:

I just happened to notice that in the SPI Wizard Step #3, Avaliable Sub Categories is spelled incorrectly. Also, Sub Categories should be Subcategories or Sub-categories.

Quote:

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Originally posted by MartinLiss
I just happened to notice that in the SPI Wizard Step #3, Avaliable Sub Categories is spelled incorrectly. Also, Sub Categories should be Subcategories or Sub-categories.

---

Fixed:D

In the end it dpends on what the user expects... if this is an automation from an existing manual system then simply try to make it as similar as possible (with a few improvements) to the hardcopy.

jhermiz: your designs are too big. They take too much space, what if some user happens to use 800 x 600? It is still quite popular resolution and not everybody knows how to change it. Empty space is good, but there shouldn't be too much of it :)

Hmm, I tend to make my forms resizable...

Quote:

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Originally posted by Merri
jhermiz: your designs are too big. They take too much space, what if some user happens to use 800 x 600? It is still quite popular resolution and not everybody knows how to change it. Empty space is good, but there shouldn't be too much of it :)

Hmm, I tend to make my forms resizable...

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95% of my forms are resizable..who said I wasn't using the resize event? This is an internal client server application...everyone in the company has 19-21" monitors.

Also I have code to resize the controls when the form is resized.

:D

Quote:

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Originally posted by Merri
jhermiz: your designs are too big. They take too much space, what if some user happens to use 800 x 600? It is still quite popular resolution and not everybody knows how to change it. Empty space is good, but there shouldn't be too much of it :)

Hmm, I tend to make my forms resizable...

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Empty space? Where? You need a bit of empty space and mine is perfect. The form you posted has all the text bolded..any reason? It's also not attractive...and involves way too much clicking...I don't like it :cry:

It also doesn't have a control box (how do I minimize, maximize, or close quickly..) a lot of people are used to having that and your form just has a done / save button. I generally move my mouse to the top right corner to quickly close it to cancel or basically say I don't want to make changes. Where's the help on this form? No use of context ID's ? No color scheme at all...what if I set focus to a control? When do I need to click save, after every change? How does this thing work..click each item on a list box just to modify it ? Why not use a grid? :eek:

Quote:

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Originally posted by Merri
Also, custom colors look ugly if somebody happens not to use Windows default color scheme. Like, someone might have text color white and otherwise a quite dark theme... so either use Windows system colors (tooltip color might work sometimes besides default white).

I think the form posted could be better. At the moment it has too much stuff in it, even if it is quite clear. I'm not too sure on what for the form is done so I can't give a good suggestion myself. But I'm sure there is a way to make it feel lighter and yet keep all the required functionality.

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Dont be afraid to use system colors:
when changing color in design time use the system colors tab and choose the type of object u need.

I have created a "fake" tool tip with form, and the colors are various between users in my computer, due to changes in thair own color scheme.

We believe in the KISS philosophy - keep-it-simple-stupid...

First and foremost, if you are doing something that M$ already does, like a MSGBOX with a YES/NO type question for SAVE - then make it just like M$ - 97% of the users out there are Microsoft and the people who train your software will appreciate consistency.

Second - did I say "consistency" - do it the SAME EVERYWHERE - otherwise you are shooting yourself in the foot.

Third - back to KISS - less colors, not more. SAP software has like 4000+ colors, actually chosen by a design firm - have you ever seen it - they are nuts. We use a CYAN color for the ACTIVE TEXT BOX. We use YELLOW for ERROR MESSAGES in labels and YELLOW for grid cells that are left "invalid". We use GREEN to denote a row that's been changed (just in column one).

Already got burned by this on a PROJECTOR at a DEMO - the YELLOW and GREEN looked identical - who would have thought.

But if you move away from the 8 or 16 basic colors, be prepared to test your app on lots of monitors and know what you are getting yourself into.

Fourth - things seem to be designed in WINDOWS from the UPPER LEFT (most important) to the LOWER RIGHT (no big deal). UPPER LEFT is where it's all going on. MENU - TOOLBAR. That's where the user looks. Putting something in the LOWER RIGHT corner of a form means it ain't important. That's our opinion anyway. We put our control box of command buttons in the UPPER LEFT corner. The exact same control box on each and every form - even if some are grey'd out.

Fifth - mouse requirements will burn you. The user must be able to stay on the keyboard and do work. If the job of a form is to load invoices, then count the keystrokes to perform the action. They must be minimized. Everytime you force the user to mouse click, they will hate you. Mouse clicks are fine for "out-of-the-ordinary" things on a form - but basic maneuvering must be by ENTER or TAB. The most complex routine in our app's is our FocusPilot SUB - it determines where the user last was - what state the program is in - and where focus ought to go next. VB TAB order is useless.

Quote:

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Originally posted by szlamany
We believe in the KISS philosophy - keep-it-simple-stupid...
Fourth - things seem to be designed in WINDOWS from the UPPER LEFT (most important) to the LOWER RIGHT (no big deal). UPPER LEFT is where it's all going on. MENU - TOOLBAR. That's where the user looks. Putting something in the LOWER RIGHT corner of a form means it ain't important. That's our opinion anyway. We put our control box of command buttons in the UPPER LEFT corner. The exact same control box on each and every form - even if some are grey'd out.

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i believe that English is the reason for Upper Left > Lower Right.

HEBREW RULES...;)

Quote:

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Originally posted by Lemon Lime
i believe that English is the reason for Upper Left > Lower Right.

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Totally backwards too - LEFT is SINISTER - RIGHT (side) is RIGHT (correct) is JUSTICE - seated at the right-hand of the...

Latin makes the most sense - but then again, they didn't have a zero (what "base" was that number system??) ;)

Quote:

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Originally posted by jhermiz
The form you posted has all the text bolded..any reason? It's also not attractive...and involves way too much clicking...I don't like it :cry:

It also doesn't have a control box (how do I minimize, maximize, or close quickly..) a lot of people are used to having that and your form just has a done / save button. I generally move my mouse to the top right corner to quickly close it to cancel or basically say I don't want to make changes. Where's the help on this form? No use of context ID's ? No color scheme at all...what if I set focus to a control? When do I need to click save, after every change? How does this thing work..click each item on a list box just to modify it ? Why not use a grid? :eek: [/B]

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Just use enter and you don't need to click a single time. I can perfectly go through the form without a click. And the form doesn't have control box because it is a sample. Also, help files are basically useless (and again, this is a sample, why it would have a help button?). And the color scheme imitates the Windows 2000 style, thus white/grey style. I like it a lot better than Windows XP colors. Bold text is there because I happen to like it sometimes.

As for the Grid, nowadays I never use OCXs unless I'm helping someone out here in the forums. I used ListBox because it is easy to add and you could make it look better by setting a custom tab space (as I mentioned earlier in this topic).


Then the logic of the form:

- pick an item to edit from the combobox in the top
- change values below, move by tab or by enter (I didn't code enter to generally work in all controls => sample)
- click Save to save changes to that particular item or pick another item to discard changes
- click Done to close the window (and of course if it had unsaved data, there should be a confirm messagebox)


Generally, all I can say it is a sample. This just to point out the difference between commenting my design form and your ready and polished designs. Somehow, I feel like getting a bomb for giving constructive critic so you could make your design better.


And the resize comment didn't have anything to do with your designs ;)

Quote:

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Originally posted by szlamany
Totally backwards too - LEFT is SINISTER - RIGHT (side) is RIGHT (correct) is JUSTICE - seated at the right-hand of the...

Latin makes the most sense - but then again, they didn't have a zero (what "base" was that number system??) ;)

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actually when I'm writeing in Hebrew with PILOT 0.7 the paper looks like someone spitted on it and tried to ruin my notebook.
so i probobly have to be left handed (like 10% of people in earth)

:bigyello:

Quote:

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Generally, all I can say it is a sample. This just to point out the difference between commenting my design form and your ready and polished designs. Somehow, I feel like getting a bomb for giving constructive critic so you could make your design better.

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I'd say my design looks a helluva lot better than yours :D
Help is useless ???? WHAT!!!! How can help files be useless ???
:confused: :confused: :confused:

Quote:

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And the resize comment didn't have anything to do with your designs ;) [/B]

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Sure looked like it was aimed at me. :cry:

Help files - who reads them anyway?

Help files sell software - but if a user has access to a help-desk or help-line, they are asking for help there - never going to read the help doc. It's smoke-and-mirrors - just like fancy colors...

I also have the luxury of having some customers with a large budget and 17 to 19" monitors. We can happily develop for a fixed resolution for them. Matter of fact - with flat-screen monitors, the resolution has to be chosen before they are ordered, as the res only works good at the "manufactured" level.

I also deal with school districts with no $$'s and resolutions from 800x600 to all the way up.

Re-size is not what it's all cracked up to be - if a low-end user touches (accidentally stumbles upon) a re-size control, they are more likely to destroy the useability of the form then to make it fit neatly into a bunch of other forms.

We are still debating whether a control-box on our MDI-child forms is going to be too much for low-end users. We currently have a tab-strip at the bottom of our MDI-parent, to allow the user to easily find the child-form - kind of like a mini-task-bar. We have those child-forms locked for size and position right now...

Ever open 10 excel spreadsheets at once an notice how unnatural moving between them is? Or a bunch of PDF docs in ADOBE.

Quote:

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Originally posted by jhermiz
I'd say my design looks a helluva lot better than yours :D

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I'd say your design might look nice, but it is pretty confusing, stuffed and having empty space where it isn't required. You could easily decrease the number of required objects to half, maybe even more, without taking out any feature and by doing so make the program a lot easier to use for the end user.

A good design isn't just candy and a lot of pretty controls, it needs to be as simple as possible (to make it easy to use), familiar (your design doesn't follow Microsoft style almost at all) and powerful (fast for the user to do his/her task).

Oh well, in the other hand, you've been giving so rich replies I guess this is just written for nothing...

Quote:

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Originally posted by Merri
I'd say your design might look nice, but it is pretty confusing, stuffed and having empty space where it isn't required. You could easily decrease the number of required objects to half, maybe even more, without taking out any feature and by doing so make the program a lot easier to use for the end user.

A good design isn't just candy and a lot of pretty controls, it needs to be as simple as possible (to make it easy to use), familiar (your design doesn't follow Microsoft style almost at all) and powerful (fast for the user to do his/her task).

Oh well, in the other hand, you've been giving so rich replies I guess this is just written for nothing...

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Do you even understand the business logic I deal with?
You must be a psychic ?

Quote:

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Originally posted by Merri
I'd say your design might look nice, but it is pretty confusing, stuffed and having empty space where it isn't required. You could easily decrease the number of required objects to half, maybe even more, without taking out any feature and by doing so make the program a lot easier to use for the end user.

A good design isn't just candy and a lot of pretty controls, it needs to be as simple as possible (to make it easy to use), familiar (your design doesn't follow Microsoft style almost at all) and powerful (fast for the user to do his/her task).

Oh well, in the other hand, you've been giving so rich replies I guess this is just written for nothing...

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stuffed and having empty space ??? :confused: :confused:
can you please make some sense...where do you see stuffed? Where do you see empty space...the client requires a lot of empty space other wise the form would be too jumbled...too me and to end users having some room makes a lot more sense than stuffing it all together...but according to you I belong to both ????

You don't make any sense...who said I was designing a windows OS ? I have the basic layout of cmd buttons "Ok" and "Exit" ... "Save" ... I have resizing for all my forms which takes care of size ... which you were complaining about originally yet couldn't back it up later on when I mentioned that I handled this. You say it's confusing, yet when's the last time you logged into my application? BTW if you did not notice its all step by step..I use tab indexes...so you select sometihng tab over and select something else. What's so hard about that? I also make full use of help context id's but to you help files are nonsense :confused: :confused: :confused: ...

Who said it's all about eye candy? There is a lot of advanced functionality in that form...I just happen to design my forms a lot more cleaner and nicer looking than yours. Look at your form..you're using a frigging list box to set values in a frigging table!!!! That's useless...hideous...You also BOLD all of your text...since when was that the MS standards ? You have no control boxes, help context (no excuse about it being a sample...this is a thread about how to design a form..and that's your design).

And then you say powerful fast for the user? I don't embed SQL like the majority of horrible VB coders. I use stored procedures and again did you login to my application and test for speed? Do you want some numbers to compare? Or is there a specific algorithm I am not using correctly?

Can you also suggest what objects I can get rid of since you know about the business logic. It amazes me that you know how the applicaiton works and you've never seen it. Which combo boxes should I get rid of???:lol:

Come on make valid points..not useless ones.

Anyone else with valid feedback?

If you guys want to argue, please do it offline.

Hello!

So many different views and so many types of designs people use worldwide. But jhermiz (no offense) i did'nt liked your design. It does not looks professional in any way (again please no offense). Its just my view...i mean to say why you are using a dark grey background ?

For example your Menu screen shot has little colour bugs (though they can be fixed) but it will always be a problem from pc to pc. Also in the colour properties thingy you're not using the standard colour picker available using common dialog controls people use those standard dialogs only and they like to use only those as they are familiar with those. If you show them something else they get confused (for eg. what if a newbie who just did a basic window course is trying to use your program ? he will have a hard time figuring out your dialog).

Also szlamany i want a technology in my software that should be called "Keep it simple for even Newbie". Because software is made for us and we're not made for the software. I hope you understand what i am trying to say here. And i must agree that no one uses help files in the first place.

This thread is getting longer for good. I guess. The more people contribute the more standards we see what is being used now a days.

Thanks!