Hi Boris,

I have discovered two problems with this approach:

- The widget is always being displayed on top. If you change to another tab, the widget is still on top;

- I cannot seem to remove the widget.

Do you have any suggestions on how to overcome these issues?

Thank you,

Alex

Hello acollins,

Thank you for your feedback. I believe that this could be in a great assistance to our community members. I am glad to hear that you were able to find such approach.

I'm not sure whether there is an official way to do this. However, this approach seems to work:

using System.Runtime.Serialization;

using System.Windows.Forms;

using Infragistics.Win;

using Infragistics.Win.UltraWinToolbars;

namespace CustomTools

{

    public class UniqueInstanceControlContainerTool : ControlContainerTool

    {

        public override Control Control { get; set; }

        public UniqueInstanceControlContainerTool(string key) : base(key)

        {

            Control = new TextBox();

        }

        public UniqueInstanceControlContainerTool(SerializationInfo info, StreamingContext context) : base(info, context)

        {

        }

        protected override ToolBase Clone(bool cloneNewInstance)

        {

            var tool = new UniqueInstanceControlContainerTool(Key);

            tool.InitializeFrom(this, true);

            return tool;

        }

        private UIElement GetControlContainerToolUIElement(ToolBase tool, UIElement parentElement, UIElement previousElement, bool drawAsActive, bool drawAsPressed)

        {

            var containerToolUiElement = new ControlContainerToolUIElement(parentElement, tool, Control);

            return (UIElement)containerToolUiElement;

        }

        protected override UIElement GetRibbonToolUIElement(ToolBase tool, UIElement parentElement, UIElement previousElement, bool drawAsActive, bool drawAsPressed)

        {

            return GetControlContainerToolUIElement(tool, parentElement, previousElement, drawAsActive, drawAsPressed);

        }

        protected override UIElement GetToolbarUIElement(ToolBase tool, UIElement parentElement, UIElement previousElement, bool drawAsActive, bool drawAsPressed)

        {

            return GetControlContainerToolUIElement(tool, parentElement, previousElement, drawAsActive, drawAsPressed);

        }

        protected override bool IsContainedControlShared

        {

            get { return false; }

        }

        protected override ToolBase ToolWithContainedControl

        {

            get { return this; }

        }

    }

}

Hi Boris,

Thank you very much for your reply. In the end, we've decided to go with a Windows Forms version of the Control instead of WPF.

Since we use an abstraction layer I do not have access to the underlying Form. Therefore creating the unique backing Control for each ControlContainerTool and adding it to the ClientArea's Controls is problematic.

I would like to be able to create a custom Tool that creates and owns the underlying Control. In other words, I want to be able to offer the same behaviour as the Tools you provide.

I see that I should be able to create a class derived from ToolBase. Presumably, in order to access the IContainer in which to place my Control, I go through the Owner property.

I would be very helpful if there was a simple example showing a derived class based on ToolBase, rather than a simple refinement of one of your existing Tools.

Thank you,

Alex

Hello,

You could put the ElementHost in a Panel and assign the Panel to the Control property of the ControlContainerTool. It was Chris Shea who shed light on this, I tried it with your sample and it works fine.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you need any additional assistance.