Chapter 9. Designing and Using Windows Forms

For any Microsoft Windows program, forms are the essence of the user interface. A Windows desktop program that never displays a form has no way to directly interact with its user and therefore no way to find out what the user wants it to do. Even systems tasks that run in the background and never display a form themselves have configuration programs that display forms. Forms are everywhere.

Blank forms, of course, are about as informative as a blank sheet of paper and about as useful as an elevator with no buttons. That’s why designers fill them with menu bars, toolbar buttons, text boxes, picture boxes, drop-down lists, and all the other paraphernalia of modern user interfaces.

This chapter deals a bit ...

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