Interacting with custom made controls

[jdc20181]

I have a custom control that has a tab control that when a new tab is created it also has a toolstrip with a few buttons and a text box. I want to interact with those as they exist e.g selected index - and as needed from the form (Very important) - one of the libraries I am using doesn't work well with button interactions outside of the parent form. And I cannot have the control placed on the tabs as part of the custom hardcode either as it does not work correctly (and known issue they basically said it was unsupported lmao)

I have also slimmed the control to be WITHOUT the tab control and just try and add this on the fly, but that too is failing.


My brain is weak from not really doing VB.NET for a while so looking for inputs on solutions.

I have tried a simple address e.g.

   Private Sub ButtonFavorites_Click(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles BrowserURLBar1.ButtonFavorites.Click
        ' Handle the Favorites button click event
        MessageBox.Show("Favorites button clicked!")
    End Sub

Can someone jar my brain and explain how to interact with buttons on a custom control? It is probably easier than I am making it.

[jmcilhinney]

You don't interact with child controls. If you have created what sounds like a user control, all interact from the outside should be done with that. Any members of child controls that you need to work with from the outside should be exposed by what I call pass-through members. For instance, if you had a child TextBox then you might add a property to the parent control that exposed the Text property:

Public Property TextBox1Text As String
    Get
        Return TextBox1.Text
    End Get
    Set
        TextBox1.Text = value
    End Set
End Property

In the case of a Button, it is the Click event that you want to pass through:

Public Event Button1Click As EventHandler
 
Private Sub Button1_Click(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
    RaiseEvent Button1Click(Me, EventArgs.Empty)
End Sub

[jdc20181]

Thanks that seems to send me in the right direction. I have started to also add a new tab button, by painting the button on the control, it seems that it works in the designer but not at run time. May start a new thread for that issue as it seems to be a whole new slew of what ifs on a solution.

[.paul.]

Here’s an example that might help…

https://www.vbforums.com/showthread....ded-TabControl

[SKPTitleLLC]

Interacting with custom-made controls in Visual Basic (VB) involves creating, manipulating, and responding to events of controls that you design or customize for your VB application. Here's a general overview of how to work with custom controls in VB:

Create a Custom Control:

You can create custom controls by either inheriting from existing controls (user controls) or building entirely new controls from scratch.
Design the Custom Control:

Use the Visual Studio Designer to design the appearance and behavior of your custom control.
Customize properties, events, and methods as needed to achieve the desired functionality.
Add Custom Control to a Form:

In the VB.NET designer, you can drag and drop your custom control onto a Windows Form or a user control.
Interact with the Custom Control:

Set properties: You can set properties of your custom control programmatically to configure its appearance and behavior.
Handle events: Register event handlers for the custom control's events. This allows you to respond to user actions or changes in the control's state.
Call methods: Invoke methods of the custom control to trigger specific actions or behaviors.

[vbdotnut]

You can also create Public methods or functions and pass arguments in. Here are some examples, obviously the controls in this example are just created for example and dont belong to any container so this wont work unless the controls are visible on a form/usercontrol. Just to give you an idea.

Public Class Class1
    Private _Class2 As New Class2
    Private Button1 As New Button

    Public Sub New()
        AddHandler Button1.Click, Sub()
                                      Dim SomeObj As New Object 'can be anything
                                      _Class2.SetButton1Stuff("Your Button Text", SomeObj)


                                      _Class2.ClickButton1("Your msg txt")
                                  End Sub
    End Sub
End Class

Public Class Class2
    Private Button1 As New Button
    Private Msg As String = String.Empty

    Public Sub New()
        AddHandler Button1.Click, Sub()
                                      MsgBox(Msg)
                                  End Sub
    End Sub

    Public Sub ClickButton1(ByVal MsgTxt As String)
        Msg = MsgTxt
        Button1.PerformClick()
    End Sub

    Public Sub SetButton1Stuff(Optional ButtonText As String = "Default Text", Optional _Tag As Object = Nothing)
        Button1.Text = ButtonText
        Button1.Tag = _Tag
    End Sub
End Class

[vbdotnut]

Interacting with custom-made controls in Visual Basic (VB) involves creating, manipulating, and responding to events of controls that you design or customize for your VB application. Here's a general overview of how to work with custom controls in VB:

Create a Custom Control:

You can create custom controls by either inheriting from existing controls (user controls) or building entirely new controls from scratch.
Design the Custom Control:

Use the Visual Studio Designer to design the appearance and behavior of your custom control.
Customize properties, events, and methods as needed to achieve the desired functionality.
Add Custom Control to a Form:

In the VB.NET designer, you can drag and drop your custom control onto a Windows Form or a user control.
Interact with the Custom Control:

Set properties: You can set properties of your custom control programmatically to configure its appearance and behavior.
Handle events: Register event handlers for the custom control's events. This allows you to respond to user actions or changes in the control's state.
Call methods: Invoke methods of the custom control to trigger specific actions or behaviors.

Would be nice to downvote this gpt response