[2005] Develop Vista Application

[michaelrawi]

I've installed VB2005 Express on my PC with Vista as it's OS. However, like XP, it won't apply Vista style from most VB2005 control (I tried textbox, combo box, and listbox. I assumed all control won't apply it). Does it need manifest file (again) ? I don't understand why Microsoft didn't make standard control that will apply any visual style provided by OS automatically ? Is it hard to make it or what ?

Regards

Michael

[tylerm]

Visual Studio 2005 takes your current theme when displaying. If your're running the classic theme or a custom theme (Stardock) then it wont appear for you. As well if the user is running a different them than you, they won't see the same style of controls. As a note, if the user is running Windows 2000, they will not see XP/Vista styles.

Visual Studio should show the style right in both XP and Vista, at least it does for me.

[michaelrawi]

Visual Studio should show the style right in both XP and Vista, at least it does for me.

Not for me. The textbox, Combo Box and List Box didn't apply Vista theme. It's still like XP style. Vista Textbox has a "glass" effect, but when I created a textbox with Visual Studio, it didn't apply it's styles. I'm sure I've checked "Enable Application Framework" in my project.

FYI, I have Vista Ultimate installed both in my laptop and my desktop PC(both at home, while now in my office, I use XP ).
For my laptop, I use VB2005 Express and has Aero style enabled.
For my desktop, I use VS2005 Professional SP1 (But I still haven't install SP1 for Vista Beta), and I have Aero feature disabled (due to driver incompatibility wiht my ATI VGA card, I guess).

[jmcilhinney]

I haven't used Vista or developed for it so I don't know all the details, but here is some information that will probably be useful.

.NET 2.0 uses the System.Windows.Forms namespace for WinForms controls. .NET 3.0 is a superset of .NET 2.0 that includes assemblies and namespaces specifically supporting Vista features, including Windows Presentation Foundation. To develop applications that use native Vista UI features you probably have to install .NET 3.0 and the VS 2005 extensions that support the Vista features. You will then have to use the assemblies and namespaces that include Vista support in place of System.Windows.Forms. As always, MSDN has ALL the information.

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-au/vstudio/aa973758.aspx
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-au/library/ms754130.aspx

[RobDog888]

I've installed VB2005 Express on my PC with Vista as it's OS. However, like XP, it won't apply Vista style from most VB2005 control (I tried textbox, combo box, and listbox. I assumed all control won't apply it). Does it need manifest file (again) ? I don't understand why Microsoft didn't make standard control that will apply any visual style provided by OS automatically ? Is it hard to make it or what ?

Regards

Michael

It uses the "Desktop Windows Manager" to apply "themes" and the old manifest trick will not apply the styles.

My original thread on Vista and VB - http://vbforums.com/showthread.php?t=441711

[michaelrawi]

To develop applications that use native Vista UI features you probably have to install .NET 3.0 and the VS 2005 extensions that support the Vista features. You will then have to use the assemblies and namespaces that include Vista support in place of System.Windows.Forms. As always, MSDN has ALL the information.

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-au/vstudio/aa973758.aspx
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-au/library/ms754130.aspx

I already have ".NET Framework 3", "Visual Studio 2005 extensions for .NET Framework 3.0 (WCF & WPF), November 2006 CTP" and "Visual Studio 2005 Extensions for Windows Workflow Foundation (EN)", installed in my office. Due to some conflict in my local MSDN (Some topics are gone. I've posted somewhere on this forum), I removed them, but keep .NET Framework 3. Unfortunately, my office still run under XP, and didn't think to install them with Vista (until you mentioned it ). Maybe I will try to install them on Vista.

My original thread on Vista and VB - http://vbforums.com/showthread.php?t=441711

Yes, I'm already read that too. I already download VS2005 SP1 shortly after it's release (I participate in SP1 Beta too ). However, I still can't find any article about the "Desktop Windows Manager". Do you have any article/direct link about this ? It's so lag to browse MSDN right now (and VBForums too). Asia still has some internet connection problem due to earthquake a few days ago.