There are various ways you can get a form to your application:

• If you create a Windows Forms Application, it creates a starting form for you
• After starting an empty project or a Windows Forms Application, you can add a form to it. To do this, on the main menu, you can click Project -> Add New Item... Select Windows Form. Give it a name and click OK
• You can dynamically create a form and add it to your application.

In Lesson 2, we saw that a was based on the Form class that is defined in the System::Windows::Forms namespace created in the System.Windows.Forms.dll assembly. Therefore, if you start an application from scratch and you want to use a form in it, you can include the System.Windows.Forms.dll library to your application. To refer to a form, you can include the System::Windows::Forms namespace in your application.

As seen in Lesson 2, to create a form-based application, you can derive a class from Form. Here is an example:

#include <windows.h>

#using <System.dll>
#using <System.Windows.Forms.dll>

using namespace System;
using namespace System::Windows::Forms;

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
    }
};

int APIENTRY WinMain(HINSTANCE hInstance,
		     HINSTANCE hPrevInstance,
		     LPSTR lpCmdLine,
		     int nCmdShow)
{
    Application::Run(gcnew CExercise());

    return 0;
}

1. Start Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 or Visual Studio 2005 and create a new Windows Forms Application named CPAR1
2. Press Ctrl + F5 to test the program
3. Close the form and return to your programming environment

A form is made of various sections that allow its control as a Windows object and other aspects that play a valuable part as a host of other objects. The top section of a form is made of a long portion called the title bar.

On the left side of the title bar, the form displays a small picture called an icon or the system icon. Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 provides a default icon for all forms. If you want to use a different icon, while the form is selected, in the Properties window, you can click the Icon field and then click its ellipsis button . This would launch the Open dialog box from where you can locate an icon and open it.

To change the icon programmatically, declare a variable of type Icon of the System::Drawing namespace and initialize it with the name of an icon file using the gcnew operator. After initializing the icon, assign it to the form's Icon property. Here is an example:

#include <windows.h>

#using <System.dll>
#using <System.Drawing.dll>
#using <System.Windows.Forms.dll>

using namespace System;
using namespace System::Drawing;
using namespace System::Windows::Forms;

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
	System::Drawing::Icon ^ customIcon =
			gcnew System::Drawing::Icon(L"C:\\Programs\\RedBook.ico");
        Icon = customIcon;
    }
};

1. In the Resource View, right-click CPAR1 -> Add -> Resource...
    
   
2. In the Add Resource dialog box, click Icon and click New
3. Design the icon as follows:
    
   
4. To continue with the icon design, on the main menu, click Image -> New Image Type... On the New Icon Image Type, make sure the first 16x16, 16 colors item is selected:
    
   
5. Click OK
6. Design it as follows:
    
   
7. In the Resource View, click IDI_ICON1
8. In the Properties window, change the filename to cpas.ico
9. Change the ID to IDI_CPAS
10. To save the icon, on the Standard toolbar, click the Save All button
11. Close the window tab that contains the icon designed
12. Click the body of the form to make sure it is selected. In the Properties window, click Icon and click its ellipsis button
13. On the Open dialog box, locate the folder in which you had saved the project and select the icon1 icon
     
    
14. Click Open
     
    
15. Execute the application to test it
16. Close it and return to your programming environment

On the right side of the system icon, there is a word or a group of words called the caption. By default, the caption displays the name of the form. If you want to change the caption, while the form is selected, in the Properties window, click the Text field and type anything you want. After typing the text, press Enter to display it on the form.

At design time, the caption is made of text that you type "as is". At run time, you can change the caption to display a more complex text that could be a changing time, the result of a calculation, etc. Here is an example:

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
	Text = L"Windows Fundmentals - Programming";
        Icon = gcnew System::Drawing::Icon(L"C:\\Programs\\RedBook.ico");
    }
};

This would produce:

1. While the form is selected, in the Properties window, click Text and type
   College Park Auto Shop - Customer Repair Order
2. Press Enter

On the right side of the caption, there are three small buttons called the system buttons, made of the Minimize (,, or ), the Maximize (,, or ), and the Close (, , or ) buttons. The presence or absence of these buttons is controlled by the Boolean ControlBox property whose default value is True to indicate that the form will be equipped with the system buttons. If you set it to False, no system button would be displayed:

In this case, the user would not be able to close the form using the system buttons. Therefore, if you create this type of form, make sure you provide the user with a way to close it.

The Minimize (,, or ) button is controlled by a Boolean property called MinimizeBox. By default, when you freshly create a form, this property is set to True and the form would display a Minimize button.

The Maximize (,, or ) button is controlled by the Boolean MaximizeBox property, which also is set to True by default. Depending on what you are trying to achieve in your application, you can change the value of either one or both of these properties. The four combinations are as follows:

MaximizeBox	MinimizeBox	Display	Result
True	True		The form can be minimized or maximized
True	False		The form can be maximized but cannot be minimized
False	True		The form can be minimized but cannot be maximized
False	False		The form can be neither minimized nor maximized

To change a system button programmatically, call the desired button's property and assign it a true or false value. Here is an example that makes sure the user cannot maximize the form:

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
	Text = L"Windows Fundmentals - Programming";
        Icon = gcnew System::Drawing::Icon(L"C:\\Programs\\RedBook.ico");
	
	ControlBox = true;
	MinimizeBox = true;
	MaximizeBox = false;
    }
};

This would produce:

1. To make sure that the user cannot maximize the form, on the Properties window, click the MaximizeBox field to reveal its combo box and select False
2. Test the program
    
   
3. Close the form and return to your programming environment

When you create an application and while you are designing the form, it is fixed in the top-left corner of the Form Designer. This is not the position the form would have when it runs. In fact, by default, a random position is set for the form when it comes up. Fortunately, you can specify where the form would be located when it comes up and you have various alternatives.

Like every control on an application, a form has a parent: the desktop. The desktop is the wide area of the monitor easily seen when the computer comes up. Everything on the computer is located with regards to this main parent. In the same way, a form uses the desktop to determine its "physical" location. Based on this, when an application is launched, its form occupies an area of the desktop. To locate its children, the desktop uses a Cartesian coordinate system whose origin is located on the top-left corner of the screen:

The horizontal measurements move from the origin to the right. The vertical measurements move from the origin to the bottom:

The distance from the the desktop's left border to the form's left border is represented by the form's Left property. The distance from the desktop's top border to the form's top border is specified by the Top property. Therefore, the Left and the Top values are known as the form's location. This can be illustrated as follows:

To specify the default location of a form when the application is opened, in the Properties window, click the + button of the Location field to reveal the values of the location. If a value of a property is set to 0, the compiler would select a random value for it when the form comes up. Otherwise, you can change each value to a valid natural number.

If you want to programmatically set the location of the form, you can assign a value to its Left and/or its Top properties. Here is an example:

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
	Left = 228;
	Top  = 146;
    }
};

Alternatively, you can assign a Point variable to the form's Location property. Here is an example:

#include <windows.h>

#using <System.dll>
#using <System.Drawing.dll>
#using <System.Windows.Forms.dll>

using namespace System;
using namespace System::Drawing;
using namespace System::Windows::Forms;

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
	Location = Point(228, 146);
    }
};

At design time, the X and Y values of the Location property allow you to specify a precise position for the form. At run time, the Left and Top properties accomplish the same purpose. The Form class provides an alternative position to specify the location of the form relative to its parent. This is the role of the StartPosition property, which is a value of the FormStartPosition enumerator. It provides the following five values:

Based on this, to set the default relative location of a form when it comes up, change the value of its StartPosition combo box in the Properties window. To specify this characteristic when programmatically creating a form or to change this property at run time, call the FormStartPosition enumeration to select the desired value and assign it to the StartPosition property of the form. Here is an example:

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
	StartPosition = FormStartPosition::WindowsDefaultLocation;
    }
};

The StartPosition property provides another value that is related to the size. Therefore, we will mention it when we review the size of a form.

1. Click the middle of the form to make sure it is selected
2. In the Properties window, click StartPosition to reveal its combo box. Click the arrow of its combo box and select CenterScreen
3. Execute the application to view the result. Notice that it is centered on the screen
4. Close it and return to your programming environment

When creating your application, you can configure its (main) form to be minimized or maximized when the application is launched. This feature is controlled by the WindowState property. The default value of this property is Normal which means the form would appear in the same dimensions it was designed. If you want the form to be minimized or maximized at startup, in the Properties window, change the desired value of the WindowState property to Maximized or Minimized.

To control the window's state programmatically, assign the Maximized or Minimized value, which are members of the FormWindowState enumerator, to the WindowState property. Here is an example:

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
        Text = L"A Day at the Beach";
        Icon = gcnew System::Drawing::Icon(L"C:\\Programs\\RedBook.ico");
		
	WindowState = FormWindowState::Maximized;
    }
};

If you want to check the state of a window before taking action, simply use a conditional statement to compare its WindowState property with the Normal, the Maximized, or the Minimized values.

When an application displays on the screen along with other applications, its form can be positioned on top of, or behind, forms of other applications. This is allowed by multitasking assignments. When a form is hidden, the taskbar allows you to access it because the form would be represented by a button. This aspect of forms is controlled by the ShowInTaskbar Boolean property. Its default value is True, which indicates that the form would be represented on the taskbar by a button.

If you create an application made of various forms, you may not want to show all of its forms on the taskbar. Usually the first or main form would be enough. To prevent a button for a form to display on the taskbar, set its ShowInTaskbar property to False.

Here is an example:

public ref class CExercise : public Form
{
public:
    CExercise()
    {
	InitializeComponent();
    }

    void InitializeComponent()
    {
        Text = L"A Day at the Beach";
        Icon = gcnew System::Drawing::Icon(L"C:\\Programs\\RedBook.ico");
	WindowState = FormWindowState::Maximized;

        ShowInTaskbar = false;
    }
};

Unless you have a good reason, and it is hard to see what that reason could be, you should not set the ShowInTaksbar property of the first or main form of an application to false.