[RESOLVED] FormBorderStyle <> Extyles/Styles

[bergerkiller]

In my window class I want to keep things simple, and instead of setting (ex)style flags I want to add a "FormBorderStyle" property.
These are the (Ex)Style enumerations:

    Public Enum Styles As Long
        ControlBox = &H80000L
        MinimizeBox = &H20000L
        MaximizeBox = &H10000L
        Sizable = THICKFRAME
        Border = &H800000L
        Caption = &HC00000L
        Visible = &H10000000L
        Disabled = &H8000000L
        Child = &H40000000L
        VScrollBar = &H200000L
        HScrollBar = &H100000L
        TabStop = &H10000L
        Group = &H20000L
        ClipSiblings = &H4000000L
        ClipChildren = &H2000000L
        ThickFrame = &H40000L
        DialogFrame = &H400000L

        'initial start state
        Minimize = &H20000000L
        Maximize = &H1000000L

        Overlapped = &H0L
        Tiled = Overlapped
        OverlappedWindow = (Overlapped Or Caption Or Styles.ControlBox Or ThickFrame Or MinimizeBox Or MaximizeBox)
        TiledWindow = OverlappedWindow

        PopUp = &H80000000L
        PopUpWindow = (PopUp Or Border Or Styles.ControlBox)
    End Enum
    Public Enum ExStyles As Long
        AllowDrop = &H10L
        TopMost = &H8L
        Layered = &H80000
        Composited = &H2000000L
        NoActivate = &H8000000L
        NoInheritLayout = &H100000L
        NoParentNotify = &H4L
        ToolWindow = &H80L
        MDIChild = &H40L
        Transparent = &H20L
        WindowEdge = &H100L
        ClientEdge = &H200L
        HelpButton = &H400L
        LayoutReversed = &H400000L
        DialogModalFrame = &H1L
    End Enum

What flags are set for, for example, FormBorderStyle.FixedSingle, Fixed3D, FixedDialog etc. I first tried by displaying the flags of an already known window, but when I set these flags it doesn't change the window to the state.

Any help greatly appreciated.

[SJWhiteley]

I Believe the whole form will need to be created from scratch; you cannot simply apply a new style. That is, the style of window is only examined on construction of the form.

[bergerkiller]

I can change the window to a tool window and change the display of mi/maximizeboxes in an already initialized program. Also, I can always use "Redraw" to update the entire screen. Why wouldn't it be possible to change it after it is initialized?

Although, when I set everything to none the window does act weird and draws a dark-grey-like rectangle around the edges of where the default style should be.

[SJWhiteley]

My comment comes from using C and C++ to build windows forms applications (ugh) and from using VB6 and win32 API calls. Things may have changed, or APIs extended to do what you want.

I recall that some form styles could only be made without rebuilding the form from scratch (min/max buttons for example, as you have found, since they are rendered within the form) but the actual style of the frame could not.

There may be a way around this, I'm not sure. Perhaps WPF forms uses a different rendering than the base Forms API: this may get you the effect you want.

[bergerkiller]

Thanks for the reply. I can understand that a program can not simply change all the behaviour, look and "logic" of a window using a few style changes. I'll just keep these Exstyle and Style properties as it is, and will keep the FormBorderStyle property in the back of my head as a thing to come back to.