Datasheet

Figure 1.10 shows an example of a progress bar that has been radically changed from the WPF
ProgressBar below the slider into the dial that appears as a speedometer above the slider. The
progress bar and the dial are both the same kind of control, yet they appear entirely different. The
slider is used to test the action of both progress bars.
Blend also allows you to create a custom control, using a UserControl document, and Blend adds a
tool button in the Asset Library to allow you to instantiate your user control in Blend, just like you
add a button or list box or any control. You don’t need to write any code to create a customized
control in this way, although you can add code to enhance its functionality, if you want.
Creating custom controls and editing the styles of controls are discussed in detail in
Chapter 16. Modifying the template of a list box is discussed in Chapter 3.
FIGURE 1.10
A standard WPF progress bar on the bottom is transformed into a speedometer on the top.
Choosing layout panels
One of the things that you will probably do in the early phases of designing an interface is to
choose the layout panels that you’ll employ in the user interface. (You can see examples of the dif-
ferent types of layout panels in Figure 1.11.) Then in these panels, you’ll place child elements.
Child elements are objects placed inside another object. These objects can be more panels, or vector
art, text controls, buttons, other controls, and more. The layout panels include:
n
Canvas: You can place all elements in this panel wherever you want them. Objects in
canvas panels generally don’t resize when the canvas panel itself resizes.
n
Grid: A grid panel can be sectioned off, and nested elements placed into those sections.
You can add grid splitter controls so users can resize each section independently. Objects
in grid panels can resize both horizontally and vertically when the window is resized.
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14
Designing Next-Generation User Experiences
Part I
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