ReadOnly mode for Forms Designer

[Bill Rust]

Hi,

I've embedded the .NET forms designer in my application and need it to
operate in ReadOnly mode in certain circumstances. I want the user to be
able to select different controls on the form and view their properties but
not make any changes. How can this be accomplished?

Thanks,
Bill

[Linda Liu[MSFT]]

Hi Bill,

Based on my understanding, you implement a custom form designer in your
application and would like to make the controls you place on the form
designer readonly in the custom properties window in your application. If
I'm off base, please feel free to let me know.

I am performing research on this issue and would get the result back to you
ASAP.

I appreciate your patience!

Sincerely,
Linda Liu
Microsoft Online Community Support

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[Bill Rust]

Hi Linda,

Yes, that is essentially it. I want the user to be able to select controls
on the form in the form designer and view, but not change, the control's
properties. I also do not want them to be able to move or delete controls
from the form.

Thanks,
Bill

[Linda Liu[MSFT]]

Hi Bill,

The solution to the problem is a little complex.

To prevent the user from moving or deleting controls on the form designer,
you can set the "Locked" property of the controls to true.

To make the properties of the controls/components are read-only, since
PropertyGrid is not part of the designer, you can use an object acting as a
property bag for the selected component and assign it to the SelectedObject
property of the PropertyGrid at the event when a component is selected in
the designer.

The property bag exposes all the properties of the selected component but
make them all read-only.

If you're using .NET 1.x, you create a class and implement the
ICustomTypeDescriptor interface in this class so as to add all the
PropertyDescriptor objects of the selected component to the custom class
and add ReadOnlyAttribute to each property.

If you're using .NET 2.0, you create a class and a separate class that
implements the ICustomTypeDescriptor interface and then register this class
as the provider of descriptions for the above custom type.

For more information on how to implement custom type descriptor, please
refer to the following blog article:

http://blogs.msdn.com/msdnts/archive/2007/01/19/how-to-bind-a-datagridview-c
olumn-to-a-second-level-property-of-a-data-source.aspx

Hope this helps.
If you have any question, please feel free to let me know.

Sincerely,
Linda Liu
Microsoft Online Community Support

[Bill Rust]

Thanks very much, Linda. I'll give it a try.

[Linda Liu[MSFT]]

Hi Bill,

How about the problem now?

If you have any question, please feel free to let me know.

Thank you for using our MSDN Managed Newsgroup Support Service!

Sincerely,
Linda Liu
Microsoft Online Community Support