Frame Appearance Template
In This Topic
Overview
The entire appearance of a NForm component is controlled by a NFrameAppearance instance. Being either locally specified or globally by the NUIManager this object specifies both metrics and appearance of the non-client area of a NForm. A form may specify whether to use the global template or not if the locally set one is null (its default value). And you may always tell the form that the system look-and-feel is preferred.
Metric Settings
There are many cases when an application needs either have larger borders or higher caption. This is completely achievable with our forms as they override each non-client aspect.
The following code demonstrates how to specify custom settings for a template and assign it to a NForm:
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//create a new NFrameAppearance object //by default if no segmented images are specified the Simple rendering is applied. NFrameAppearance appearance = new NFrameAppearance(); //customize metrics appearance.LeftBorder = 8; appearance.RightBorder = 8; appearance.BottomBorder = 8; appearance.CaptionHeight = 32; //offset the caption buttons appearance.ButtonsOffset = new Size(4, 8); //create new NForm object and assign it this template NForm form = new NForm(); form.FrameAppearance = appearance; form.ShowDialog(); |
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| Visual Basic |
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'create a new NFrameAppearance object 'by default if no segmented images are specified the Simple rendering is applied. Dim appearance As NFrameAppearance = New NFrameAppearance() 'customize metrics appearance.LeftBorder = 8 appearance.RightBorder = 8 appearance.BottomBorder = 8 appearance.CaptionHeight = 32 'offset the caption buttons appearance.ButtonsOffset = New Size(4, 8) 'create new NForm object and assign it this template Dim form As NForm = New NForm() form.FrameAppearance = appearance form.ShowDialog() |
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The result of the above code:
Caption Settings
The template allows for a complete customization of the caption including both image and text. Settings like TextAlign, ImageAlign, ImageTextRelation, etc. are provided so that you can define the caption appearance that suits your forms most.
The following example demonstrates how to manipulate the image and text of a NForm's caption via the NFrameAppearance template:
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NFrameAppearance appearance = new NFrameAppearance(); //customize settings related with image and text positioning appearance.ImageTextRelation = ImageTextRelation.TextBeforeImage; appearance.ImageAlign = ContentAlignment.MiddleRight; appearance.TextAlign = ContentAlignment.MiddleRight; NForm form = new NForm(); form.FrameAppearance = appearance; form.ShowDialog(); |
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| Visual Basic |
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Dim appearance As NFrameAppearance = New NFrameAppearance() 'customize settings related with image and text positioning appearance.ImageTextRelation = ImageTextRelation.TextBeforeImage appearance.ImageAlign = ContentAlignment.MiddleRight appearance.TextAlign = ContentAlignment.MiddleRight Dim form AsNForm = New NForm() form.FrameAppearance = appearance form.ShowDialog() |
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The result of the above code:
Appearance Settings
The NFrameAppearance template object allows you to completely customize how a form will look via a set of segmented images defining how the caption, borders and system buttons like "Close", "Maximize/Restore", "Minimize" and "Help" are rendered. For more information about the segmented image semantic see Segmented Image.
See Also