I have a windows form in my vb.net application which has recently started resizing itself dependant on the computers screen resolution.
I would like the form to be a fixed width and height - how can i make it do this and not resize itself?
You may try to change the property AutoScaleMode.
The default is FONT (the correct to most different systems DPI), but you may try other options there.
UPDATE
I saw now you may set the PROPERTIES of a file in the DESKTOP to "Deactivate Dimmension in High-DPI Settings" (it´s translated from Portuguese, my system). Click in the desktop application´s properties (its icon) and go to COMPATIBILITY TAB.
It´s not a .NET solution but if Windows had put it there, is because it´s possible the only way to set it.
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I created a Windows application in VS 2013 on W7. It's running great and no issue but recently I bought a new W8 laptop and tried to run the application on W8. All my controls are misaligned and some overlap. AutoScaleMode is set to Font for each form.
Examples:
It's not Windows 8 that's the problem, but a higher DPI setting.
The best option would be to switch over to WPF, but the problem can be mitigated with some care. You might consider a TableLayoutPanel for this application (it looks table-ish to me).
If you can't/won't use a layout panel, set the AutoScaleMode property of your form (and other containers, like Panels) to Font. If that doesn't work, try Dpi. See the MSDN page on that enum for more information.
Further StackOverflow reading (or "works cited"): "Creating a DPI-Aware Application" and "How to control the font DPI in a .NET WinForms app"
I've been developing a program with Windows Forms on my work computer in VB.NET using Visual Studio 2013. When I run it on my work computer, the forms at run-time look identical to the forms in design view - the same overall size, the same layout, etc. Here is what it looks like on my work computer - AND when I access my work computer over remote desktop from my home computer.
However, on my home computer, it looks different in design view than at run-time. The form in design view is smaller and labels are misaligned.
Both computers are running Visual Studio 2013 with the same settings. I'm working on a larger monitor at home, but the fact that things look right when I access my work computer over Remote Desktop makes me think it's not my monitor.
My work computer is Windows 7 while my work computer is Windows 8.1.
Things I've tried:
Anchoring/docking the labels, but the layout ends up looking wrong
Changing the AutoScaleMode to DPI instead of Font, but that only changes the appearance at runtime, not in design view, and it still doesn't match design view.
Any ideas?
I figured it out! It was a setting in Windows on my home computer. (Still unclear why it looked right via Remote Desktop, but maybe it uses the remote computer's settings instead of the local one's).
The solution was:
Right click, choose "Screen Resolution"
Click "Make text and other items larger or smaller"
Check "Let me choose one scaling level for all my displays" and set size to "smaller - 100%"
For some reason, on my home computer the size was set to 125%.
After searching for a solution online this worked for me:
this.AutoSize = false;<br>
this.AutoScaleMode = AutoScaleMode.Font;
I put this code on form load and the display remained the same.
Is there a reason / fix for this weird designer issue (at least, I think it's related to the designer), whereby the controls on the form do not appear as they do in the design window when I debug the application..!
Please see the following two screenshots to demonstrate the problem (note: I have blacked out some of the content of the form, this is not the problem):
Picture 1: Showing how the form appears in the designer view
Picture 2: Showing how the form appears in debug mode
You can clearly see that some of the buttons have moved position on the form.
Note: At first glance, this may appear like a duplicate of: Windows Forms Designer destroys form layout. However, I have not installed any additional tools or components. This is simply a standard "vanilla" build of Visual Studio 2012 on Windows 7 32-bit.
I've also come across this question: UI Controls Overlapping & Fonts Issue in Windows Forms Application. However, I am not using "large fonts", nor am I using any non-standard fonts on my controls (all label and button text is left as default). Still, I can see how this would affect the control positions and will do some more checks in this area.
There's nothing happening within the form's Load method.
I'm also using TFS 2012.
What could be causing this? Is there anything I can do to fix it?
EDIT: I've removed the font property for each label and button control, allowing the system to set the default value. Still no change. Interestingly, if I open the form in design mode, then save it, then close it, then open it again, the buttons have moved... If I do this a few times, the buttons migrate until they're off the form.
OK, I've found the answer, after a bit more fiddling. It seems to be related to the Anchor property on the controls. I made a bunch of changes, testing between each change to see if there was any difference. When I selected all the controls and set the Anchor property to Top, Left, this solved the issue.
I hope this helps someone else at some point!
I recently upgraded my system to Windows 7 Professional. Furthermore, I recently upgraded from VB6 to VB.NET and I've been working with forms and control under the new interface. Controls such as text boxes and tab controls are washed out and very difficult to see.
In my attempt to remedy the situation, I personalized my display by unchecking the box under "Windows Color" entitled "Enable transparency" and adjusting the Color Intensity slider all the way to the right. But no matter what I try to do, I still get washed-out form colors.
Is there a setting for adjusting the default form colors? What am I missing?
It seems to me that you have a couple of choices, all of which you probably won't like.
Change your Textbox BorderStyle from Fixed3D to FixedSingle, this will give you a more pronounced border around the textboxes (no such property on comboboxes though). This will also make your textboxes look a lot more 'flat', which you may not want.
Change either the background of your form or the background of your controls, thereby providing a better contrast between the two. Even slight variations on the same color would help.
Purchase (or make your own) custom controls that have built-in style changing abilities. I use the Telerik controls sometimes. They have the ability to let you change the UI Element's styles, including all kinds of colors and different borders and such. The issue with this option is a lot of these custom controls are overly expensive, although you can find decent ones for fairly cheap sometimes (I found a control set once that was pretty nice for $19).
Whatever you decide to do, you have to remember that your form will look different to users that are using different operating systems than what you're developing on. You noticed a big change when you went from (I'm assuming) Windows XP to Windows 7 right? You have to remember to test your application on all operating systems that your application will be expected to run on. You could design it beautifully on Windows 7 and it may look horrible on XP. You may be able to ignore OSs that are older than XP, but for the time being almost 50% of users still use XP (last I checked).
BTW, there is no setting for adjusting the default form colors... this just happens to be how forms look on Windows 7. I found it an adjustment when I went from XP to Win7, but you get used to it. I very rarely make the background of my controls the same color as the background of my form just because of this... oh, and don't go changing your display, you want to see what your users are going to see - otherwise you'll end up with something that only looks good on your computer. :)
We're facing a strange problem here. One of our users cannot see two buttons on a form, that everybody else can see. I'm not sure if the buttons are not there or the window is smaller than it should be. The size of this window is fixed, so it cannot be adjusted manually. (it is like a pop-up window informt of the main window)
Our application is used by employees of our company all over the world. So they all have windows xp in different languages and their regional settings differ. But I can't see how that would make a difference.
Does anyone have an idea?
A reason for this might be that the user changed the DPI setting on its machine. Typically you would change that in the control panel, in the Display settings you can choose to have a font size of 100%, 125% and 150%. This affects the DPI and might push winforms controls further down the form, making them "invisible" (below the bottom boundary of the form).
Here are instructions on how to change DPI settings on Windows XP.
If this is the cause for your problem, you have to make sure your forms scale properly. Look at the MSDN documentation for automatic scaling.