The Flat Style ComboBox Question & Rant!

[Sibby]

I've seen this brought up before but I thought someone might have a different solution by now. (And I want to rant a little)

[rant]
Is there a way to give a flat style to a combobox? Obviously there isn't a property setting for this. And the question is....why? They added flat style settings to buttons, a "none" border style to Textboxes.....why not give the ComboBox the love too? Why not incorporate the functionality the Forms 2.0 ComboBox had? That control is great and very versatile. With ALL the new changes in .NET...they couldn't add this seemingly simple functionality? When you have a program that you want to have a flat style feel to it, and you see a big "3D" ComboBox there....it looks terrible. For me, the look of my applications are as important as its functionality and usability. Maybe it's just me though, but it's very frustrating sometimes.
[/rant]

I don't think my crutch of using the Forms 2.0 ComboBox will help me here. Hopefully someone has something.

Comments & suggestions welcome...

Thanks in advance guys!

[Edneeis]

Who knows why although if it helps I read that the next version of VS has a combobox with a flatstyle option. Better late than never I guess. In the mean time there are 3rd party free ones for .net out there just search for them. I believe CodeProject has a very nice one down in C# that you can use.

[ZeBula8]

or you could write your own 'flat' combo box control...

[Sibby]

I fully understand that. I also know that I could go off, write my own language & compiler while I'm at it. My point is, I'm a programmer. By trade I'm a lazy person....the lazier you are, the better the programmer right? I don't want to write my own control or have to call some API simply to give me a functionality that's been available on nearly every other control for years. To be honest, before I even installed .NET, one of the things I though to myself was "we'll finally have a programmer friendly combobox!", only to find out that it hadn't been touched, and yet all these other controls have the added functionality the cbo lacks. I don't know, maybe I should be thankful that I have nothing more pressing in my life right now to be able to get p*ssed off about than a VB control

I know there's more of you out there...

Sibby

[ZeBula8]

i beg to differ - the lazier you are - the less you'll get done -

don't keep askin' microsoft for handouts - stand on your own two feet, man, and do something for yourself! build that control - that new language - the new compiler - and then when you're done with that - you can come over to my house and mow my lawn.....

[Sibby]

I beg to beg to differ

The laziness in the sense that I was talking about is like so...I write my programs to most efficient and straightforward way possible for the end user. That way I get the least amount of errors, with the least amount of confusion. Any of us that work in an environment with many end users, know that they'll find something that they don't like anyway. So by being efficient up front, we get to be lazy afterward. Heh...it would be nice if it really worked that way, but it's fun to dream. Speaking of dreaming, In the .NET IDE, there's that cool looking ComboBox that allows you to select your build type.....does the ability to develop an app using a control that's used in the same environment you used to write the app....(got all that) seem out of line to ask for?

Anyway, this thread is getting off subject and I'm sorry about that. This will be my last post unless someone RE's with a sweet solution.

Sibby

[Edneeis]

The sweet solution is to grab a control that someone else made and use it instead. There are some good ones out there and it doesn't get much easier than that. So what if it isn't by Microsoft as long as it works. Search around CodeProject.com I know I've seen a good flat one over there.

[Edneeis]

Actually I'm not sure if it was CodeProject or vbAccelerator but since you are in WI and I'm a big Packers fan I'll hook you up. Try this one:

http://www.vbaccelerator.com/home/NE...es/article.asp

There was a REALLY good one at CodeProject: http://www.codeproject.com/cs/miscct...etComboBox.asp but it appears to have disappeared.