Foreground / Backgroud colors for disabled combobox

[MagellanTX]

How do you change the foreground and background colors of a disabled combo box? It is using the Windows default colors when I disable it.

I tried using DrawMode=OwnerDraw and specifying my colors in the DrawItem event but the system seems to ingoring the event.

Thanks!!

[bmcgee]

Ok I did this 2 different ways (assumes cbobox is already disabled). The first will when a button is clicked bring up a dialog box with colors to pick from. Whatever color you pick the background color will change to that color.

Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles btnChange.Click

'create ColorDialog object
Dim colorBox As ColorDialog = New ColorDialog()
Dim result As DialogResult

'show ColorDialog and get result
result = colorBox.ShowDialog()

If result = DialogResult.Cancel Then
Return
End If

' set background color to color picked from dialog
cboObj.ForeColor = colorBox.Color
cboObj.BackColor = colorBox.Color

End Sub

The second way is without a color dialog box being displayed.

Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles btnChange.Click

cboObj.BackColor = Color.Red

End Sub

The only problem is the cbobox being disabled. Reason is b/c since it is disabled it will only put a boarder aroung the interior of the cbobox and I don't think that is what you are going for. What you could do is leave the box enabled and set it to, when it is clicked change focus to another object.

Private Sub cboObj_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles cboObj.Click

'determines if the cbobox should be active, if not changes focus to something else
If strON = "F" Then
cboObj.BackColor = Color.Red
btnChange.Focus()
End If

End Sub

With this approach you can set the variable strON to something else when you want the cbobox to be active and vice versa. This is just a thought since I am not sure what you are trying to do.

Hope this helps!

[MagellanTX]

Thank you for the time you took writing that.

Your approach is pretty much what I have decided I am going to have to do. I was hoping there was a way of simply disabling it instead of just a work around. Seems to me that this would be a common problem, I can't beleive Microsoft hasn't addressed it.