Datasheet

Moving over to the left-hand side of the IDE, you can see the Toolbox window, shown in Figure 1-11,
that you pinned open (refer back to Figure 1-6 for a full shot of the IDE). This window is used to house
all of the various elements you can add to your project. By default, it is populated with the standard
windows and .NET components that Microsoft provides with Visual Studio 2005, but you can easily add
additional third-party elements to the Toolbox, as well as reposition the existing items, change the view,
and sort the lists. A discussion on all of this information can be found in Chapter 3.
Just like the various other components of the Visual Studio 2005 IDE, the Toolbox is contextual, changing
its contents based on what you’re doing. The three main views of a typical form (Design, Code, and
Class Diagram) will produce three completely different sets of items to use.
Figure 1-11 shows the default layout as shown for the sample project you created. There are entries for
the commonly used elements such as buttons and
TextBox controls, as well as Container elements such
as Panels and GroupBox components (previously known as the
Frame control). Other default groups of
components include menus and toolbars, data-related elements, and system components.
Figure 1-11
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A Quick Tour of the IDE
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