How to dynamically produce pictureboxes ?

Question

3.00/5 (3 votes)

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(1)
I am working on windows form application.

I want to create another picturebox when click in a picturebox.
Here is my code

C#

            PictureBox p = (PictureBox)sender; // Picturebox in which user clicks
            PictureBox pb = new PictureBox();

// Set the properties of new picturebox as similar to that of clicked one
            pb.Image = p.Image;
            pb.Location = new Point(100,100);
            pb.Size = p.Size;

But it doesn't show the new picturebox on the specified location.

(2)
Also, Is there any way to create a semi transparent picturebox ?

(3) How to make a picturebox transparent over next picturebox ? Setting the picturebox's backcolor to Transparent didn't work ?

Posted 9-Jan-15 6:46am

BibhutiAlmighty

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3 solutions

Solution 1

Well, and how your UI is supposed to "know" that this picture box even exists? :-)
To show a control, also set its parent. Say, you have some Control parent; which can be any container control: Panel, TabPage, Form. Then

C#

p.Parent = parent; // adds this control to parent
// same as:
parent.Control.Add(p);

—SA

Posted 9-Jan-15 7:01am

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov

Updated 9-Jan-15 7:30am

v2

Comments

BibhutiAlmighty 9-Jan-15 13:13pm

What is "parent" ?

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 9-Jan-15 13:29pm

Please read again. Do pay at least some attention when you read the answer.
Wait a minute, let me highlight the identifier in the text...
In case you don't understand the concept of parent-child relationship, you should better stop doing what you are doing and learn it.
—SA

BillWoodruff 9-Jan-15 16:48pm

fyi: newcomers to .NET Win Forms often have trouble distinguishing that the case of setting the Parent of a Control has the same result as using 'Add on the ControlCollection of a Container Control's 'Controls Property. This is compounded, sometimes, by the fact that some Win Form Controls which are not really meant to by used as Container Controls allow adding Controls to their exposed 'Controls Collection.

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 9-Jan-15 17:15pm

Understand, that's why I always emphasize this not so self-apparent fact.
—SA

[no name] 9-Jan-15 18:01pm

Sorry to ask this here. I do not know .NET very well. But I know Borland VCL (very well). In bcb there is an owner and a parent (for WinControl). Owner is responsible for dealloc, parent is the WinControl where "this" needs to be displayed. Is there something comparable in .NET? I ask this because .NET manages the memory so on a first glance owner is not needed....
Thanks, Bruno

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 9-Jan-15 18:11pm

A lot of .NET is very similar to Borland, especially Pascal and even more Delphi. Owner is very different from parent. In Forms, ownership is very important relationship for forms. It's usually important to link all (non-modal) forms with ownership. In simple terms: if you add more forms to a main form which you can make it the owner of all other forms. Then, if you activate any form, other form will appear in Z-order, the way that no window of other applications can get in between. Think of it as of the way to preserve application's UI visual integrity. Parent-child relationship is set between controls, including the Form, which is a top-level parent for all other controls. You set parent to make control appear in the UI, there is no other way.

(Done. It would rather be a whole separate question.)

—SA

[no name] 9-Jan-15 18:18pm

Thanks to answer a whole question in a comment :-)
Bruno
Uuups forgot to vote +5

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 9-Jan-15 18:20pm

You are welcome, and, thank you, Bruno.
—SA

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 9-Jan-15 18:26pm

Also: I forgot. A measure to accompany owned forms would be ShowInTaskbar = false. This way, only the main form is shown in Task bar, which, again, shows an application as a whole entity. But then, why having more than one form? Indeed, many best applications are based only on one main form.

There are exclusions though. I have only one such application (WPF), but there is a logic behind that. I'm using my own mail client which consists of two independent windows, sender (SMTP) and received (POP3). They are so independent, their threads are independent and different, so I do the opposite: thoroughly simulate the behavior of "two main forms". Each of them can activate the second one, close the application on confirmation, and so on. But this is not a very typical case.

—SA

[no name] 9-Jan-15 18:51pm

Thanks again.
For me the question was not related especally for forms (main form vs. 2child forms"). In bcb (what I think that you know it very well) this owner/parent realtion is very well organized. "Owner" is usually a TForm or a TDBmodule ...but according to the very nice design of VCL, owner can be any TComponent, but "Parent" which is GUI related is "only" to manage where to display "this" in case "this" is something to display.
....most probably I have problems to express what I mean in english...anyway thanks.
Bruno

Solution 3

C#

PictureBox p = (PictureBox)sender; // Picturebox in which user clicks
PictureBox pb = new PictureBox();

// Set the properties of new picturebox as similar to that of clicked one
pb.Image = p.Image;

// [1]
p.Parent.Controls.Add(pb);

pb.Location = new Point(100,100);
pb.Size = p.Size;

[1] Assuming you want to the new PictureBox whose Properties you copy from the source PictureBox to appear at the location 100,100 in the co-ordinate space in which the source PictureBox is located: you need to add the new PictureBox to the Control Collection of the Parent Control in which the source PictureBox exists. After you do that, you can say that both the source and new PictureBoxes have the same Parent.

Setting the Parent Property of a Control to a Container Control has the same effect as using the 'Add method of a Container Control's 'Controls Property (which is a ControlCollection object).

If you are creating multiple PictureBoxes at run-time, I'd suggest making a UserControl that you could use as a "base:" that way, all the visual-appearance properties would be automatically identical every time you created a new one. Or, you could make a Custom Control that inherited from PictureBox.

If you use such a "factory method," and keep track of the last Control created, then, if you wish, you can automatically position the next one created relative to where the previously created one is.

Transparency in Windows Forms is a tricky business, and it is inherently limited; if you really want to work with transparency, I suggest WPF.

Posted 9-Jan-15 9:31am

BillWoodruff

Updated 9-Jan-15 10:49am

v2

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**Zoltán Zörgő** · Accepted Answer · 2015-01-09T07:08:00

Solution 2

1) Add the new picturebox to the control list[^] of the form (or of the original pictures's parent)
2-3) Translucency is not simple, but can be done: http://bobpowell.net/transcontrols.aspx[^]

Posted 9-Jan-15 7:08am

Zoltán Zörgő