I have a UserControl subclass, CompanyInfo, with various controls (Labels and Textboxes) on it. When I'm designing this class, I can edit the controls, move them around etc., which is fine.

However, when I build CompanyInfo into a DLL, then add it to the Toolbox and drop it onto a form in the Designer, I can no longer edit and move the various controls that CompanyInfo encapsulates. I have tried setting these controls to public access, but that hasn't helped.

I'm using C# in VS .NET 2003. Is there any way to get these child controls to be editable when my subclass is placed on a form?

This is (by design) not possible in .net 2.0 as like in 1.1

you rather us a panel if you wan't that sort of functionalry

one sort of a solution would be a controlcollection property on your usercontrol  that exposes the collection: controls() . then you can edit the properties (sizr/location) of  your controls

example

Public ReadOnly Property HostedComtrols() As ControlCollection

Get

     Return Me.Controls

End Get

End Property

good luck

Remco

No, not out of the box

 

remco

If you have ANY solution to this problem, I'd be happy to hear it. At the moment it looks like my only options are upgrading to .NET 2.0, and/or upgrading to VS .NET 2005 - neither of which I am particularly ready to do.

The behavior you are looking for is contrary to the concept of user controls. The idea is that you, as the developer of the user control, decide what it needs to look like and how it should behave, and then the consumers of your control can use it in their form without having to worry about the layout of the individual components of the control. Why do you need to be able to edit the child controls after the control has been compiled and placed on a form?

This is (by design) not possible in .net 2.0 as like in 1.1

you rather us a panel if you wan't that sort of functionalry

one sort of a solution would be a controlcollection property on your usercontrol  that exposes the collection: controls() . then you can edit the properties (sizr/location) of  your controls

example

Public ReadOnly Property HostedComtrols() As ControlCollection

Get

     Return Me.Controls

End Get

End Property

good luck

Remco

Remco, thanks for the reply; I'll try your suggestion. As to why I'm subclassing UserControl - I tried subclassing Panel first but it gave me the same results (non-editable child components), so I switched to UserControl hoping that it would work. Unfortunately, it doesn't.

CommonGenius, the control I'm trying to build is for an internal project. The idea is that we have a basic set of Labels and Textboxes, which can be moved around and edited as needed (for example, the Textboxes might have different DataBindings in different contexts; the controls might need to be resized to fit onto a certain screen).

What i meant is just using a panel not inheriting from it

remco

remco, your sugesstion of exposing the Controls collection as a public property works great! Although it's not as intuitive as I might like, it works well enough for my purposes - so thanks.

cool

this is possible for VS2005 using the EnableDesignMode method of the ControlDesigner class.
I suggest you package your control to just have the Label and the TextBox control and not the whole suite.