Building a good looking app

[nbrege]

Is it possible to make a good looking user interface using only the standard controls in the Visual Studio toolbox? It seems all of my apps look very generic & boring, with no "curb appeal". I'm looking for some tips on how to create an attractive interface, without using 3rd party controls.
Please share some screenshots of your apps to help give me some ideas. I am not exactly creative when it comes to design. Thanks...

[sapator]

If there is a free library you could be better of using it instead of grinding the mill.
Or there are some companies that have sets of controls like telerik and devexpress.
Or you can create a web app that you have unlimited freedom (short of).

Another option might be XAML. Personally I better eat grinding dust but , hey..

[nbrege]

...Or there are some companies that have sets of controls like telerik and devexpress.

As stated in my post ... I dont want to use 3rd-party controls. Only standard controls in the VS toolbox...

[sapator]

Then you have create a new inherited control in VB and "decorate it" .
I haven't done much of that as I'm mostly DB - programmer not designer.

[dday9]

I have done a little bit of that. I have a win-forms-bootstrap codebase that provides you with (limited) Bootstrap 4 style controls: https://github.com/dday9/win-forms-bootstrap

They all inherit from Control so at the end of the day they're just the built-in controls in the toolbox decorated like sapator suggested.

[jmcilhinney]

Start using WPF instead of Windows Forms.

[nbrege]

Start using WPF instead of Windows Forms.

I thought of that, but haven't dove into it yet. Is it easy to learn?

[jmcilhinney]

Is it easy to learn?

That's relative but I'd say no, it's not. WPF and other XAML-based technologies are generally considered to have a steep learning curve - especially when you have to unlearn the WinForms paradigm - but they give you so much more freedom to create a UI the way you want it to look with just the standard tools. WinForms was created with business apps in mind. Trying to make a fancy UI with WinForms really is fighting against its design. Once you understand how WPF works, making a fancy UI is pretty easy.

[dday9]

I think it's worth mentioning that at the company I work for, we turned away a client because they had a WPF C# project and when the chief architect asked the developers if anyone wanted to work in WPF, 29 developers said no and 1 developer said yes but he wasn't enthusiastic about it.

I'm not saying that's a reason why you shouldn't learn WPF but I think it speaks to most business application designer's mentality.

[jmcilhinney]

I think it's worth mentioning that at the company I work for, we turned away a client because they had a WPF C# project and when the chief architect asked the developers if anyone wanted to work in WPF, 29 developers said no and 1 developer said yes but he wasn't enthusiastic about it.

I'm not saying that's a reason why you shouldn't learn WPF but I think it speaks to most business application designer's mentality.

I think that, for a lot of people, it's a case of what they already know with WinForms does what they need to do so they don't see a point in learning something new. That's absolutely fair if WinForms apps do what you need. If you're bumping up against the limits of WinForms though, as appears to be the case here, that should be the motivation you need to learn that new thing. There's no point fighting WinForms when the tools to do what you want easily exist and the only real problem is they don't work completely the way you're used to. If they did work that way, they wouldn't solve the problem you're trying to solve.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I've now written a sizable program in WPF. Is it difficult to learn? I'd say no, but the first few steps are difficult. XAML is a different animal. Anybody familiar with WinForms is going to have a bit of a struggle if they think of it as WinForms. It isn't quite HTML, either, so anybody who only knows HTML is going to struggle even more. On the other hand, it does feel like a well thought out system, and once I was over those first few steps, it was rather nice.

On the other hand, giving me a fancy tool is kind of like giving a monkey a paintbrush: Don't be expecting a great painting.

[Peter Porter]

One idea, istead of using buttons, use clickable labels that have no text, but only icons images. Or you can use a combination of both. Nonclickable labels with icons, next to clickable labels with text. Have the labels that have icons images (no text) to the left of clickable labels with text. Looks better visually.

[Shaggy Hiker]

That's true. Anything you can do in WPF you can do in WinForms, it just might take considerably more work. From a visual perspective, what you really get in WPF is the concept of nested structuring. For example, in WinForms, if you were to add a button to a form, you can then change the text, the back color, the fore color, and not much else through properties alone. In WPF, using XAML, the button is a container, what is in that container is up to you. Most likely, you'd add an image and some text, at a minimum, but you could add nearly anything you wanted. You can also readily transform any level of that, from the button on down. For example, if you want a button that will wrap around a second circular button, that would be hard to do in WinForms, but in WPF you could have the outer button be the container, with the second button being centered inside the outer button. You could also wrap text on the outer button, while leaving it horizontal on the inner button. Doing this with WinForms would be trickier, as you'd be best off using an image and figuring out where the click was in the image to decide whether the inner or outer button had been clicked, while changing the image to reflect what had been clicked. WPF just makes the outer button a button and the inner button a different button, so the work is done for you.

That's the advantage and disadvantage to WPF: You can do whatever you can think up, but all that versatility means there is a fair amount to learn. Whatever interface you can conceive of, you can create it in WPF, but...you'll have a bit of learning to implement anything really complicated.

[-Franky-]

There were once two programs/tools “T3 VB.NET Theme Archive” and “VB.NET Theme Manager” that made ready-made themes available free of charge for VB.NET. These programs may still be available for download somewhere. Even if the themes are not always perfect and contain a number of errors, they still show a lot of design possibilities. While you can copy the codes directly from the program with the "T3 VB.NET Theme Archive", the "VB.NET Theme Manager" always opens a link to Pastebin.com where the code can then be copied. Here is an example from the "VB.NET Theme Manager" -> Theme Butterscotch: https://pastebin.com/TxkFkfB0

[Peter Porter]

WPF is not that hard to learn. If you ever worked with HTML, you'll be able to pick-up on XAML easily.

[-Franky-]

If you want to stick with WinForms and still have the functionality of XAML, then you can also take a look at the "XAML Islands". https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/wi...e/xaml-islands

[Barry_R]

I think this looks okay for a VB4 created program. The buttons are labels and images but there is no custom anything in the source code.

[.paul.]

I think this looks okay for a VB4 created program. The buttons are labels and images but there is no custom anything in the source code.
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[Shaggy Hiker]

I think this looks okay for a VB4 created program. The buttons are labels and images but there is no custom anything in the source code.

Just goes to show that the key point to making a good looking interface is having a bit of artistic talent.

[OptionBase1]

I think this looks okay for a VB4 created program. The buttons are labels and images but there is no custom anything in the source code.

Nice!

[.paul.]

Nice!

Sorry, not to be replying to OptionBase1…
@_Barry_R
There’s plenty you can do with winforms. Have a look at the Puzzle Games link in my signature. Most of the games featured there were written in vb winforms…