The lovely .NET IDE 'mainMenu'...

[Goksly]

How does one replicate such a lovely menu?

I'm creating an application but when I add the main menu I get ye old'e internet explorer one... where I'm actually after the lovely multi-coloured .Net menu with the nice icons.

 

I've looked around on the net and the solution seems to be either huge amounts of coding (which I've failed to get to work) or an external .dll which is not an acceptable solution atm (all coding must be my own).

 

Any ideas guys? I'm pretty new to .Net but want to learn with the hands on approach. Favoured language is C# but any example code or pointers will be warmly greeted.

 

Thanks!

[lidds]

Goksly,

 

This is something that I spent a lot of time trying to find a solution and basically what I found was if you are using XP OS then you can use a manifest file (think there is another way to) to give your app. the whole XP look. I actually ended up purchasing dotnetbar which is $299 for the source code and 1 design-time license or I also found xpstyle menu for $99.95 with source code and unlimited licenses, however I have never used this one.

 

Dotnetbar on the other-hand I have found to be excellent and the support second-to-none.

 

Anyway hope this helps

 

Simon

[PlausiblyDamp]

http://www.xtremedotnettalk.com/showthread.php?t=69043 gives the source to a component that allows you to do this. There is no reason why you need to compile it to a dll though - add this code to your existing project instead.

[Goksly]

Cheers chaps...

@lidds: I'm a student so cant really afford to splash out. Plus this project is actually for a university project so cant really use other peoples code.... but of course can view other peoples code and alter them to suit my needs ;)

 

@PlausiblyDamp: tried the plugin you suggested and although its free and the guy has done very well... all it does is add an icon to the menu. This is good but only part of what I was after. I really want the whole display (two colour menu, icons and similar style when mouse is over etc). ;/

 

I really thought MS would have made this as easy as pie... dont suppose its something they are putting in .net 2.0?

 

Any further help equally warmly welcomed :)

Edited August 9, 2005 by Goksly

[PlausiblyDamp]

In .Net 2.0 there are a whole raft of new toolbar / menu features. Far far superior to the current ones. Amongst other things it fully supports icons and different rendering styles.

[Goksly]

Cool..... only 19 years to wait then :E

[lidds]

Have a look at this link

 

Code project is an excellent website to use for working examples.

 

Hope that helps

 

Simon

[Goksly]

Thank you very much for that link. I would have defo gone with that one but instead decided on this one from code project... its in C# so I can understand the code a bit better.

 

Think doing my own one is a bit out of my reach at the moment.

 

Thank you all.

[lidds]

I'm a vb.net man, so guess that's why I found that one...

 

To be honest even professional programmers will probably agree, what is the point in spending the time and effort to code something that someone else has done already.

 

Always come back here to post any problems, this is the one of the best forums that I have found, and the people here are really helpful. I started learning vb.net about 3/4 year ago and I have got a hell of a lot of knowledge, guidance and help from the people here.

 

Anyway hope your project goes OK.

 

Simon

[Goksly]

Hehe cheers.

I normally wouldnt reinvent the wheel... but when learning a new language its not so bad to re-do something as its a nice learning curve.

 

After thinking about it... reusing someone elses work isnt too bad for a project - I hope it will show the more investigative side of me :)