WinForms Accept Button Annoyance

Question

I have a base panel class that has (among other things) three buttons. I use subclasses of this base class in two different config dialogues. Both dialogues have an OK button set as the accept button.

In one of the dialogues, if I click one of the buttons in the base class, focus immediately returns to the OK button, so pressing the enter key works as expected.

In the other dialogue, focus remains wth the button in the base class that was clicked if it is enabled, or moves to the next button if the clicked button is no longer enabled.

There is no code that handles the base class button click events in either of the derived classes.

Ideas anyone?

Answer 1

i don't know what language you are using, but the button class should have a focus method that will highlite it for enter pressing. in the click method, or when you open the dialog you can call this method to make the button you want get the form's focus

c#
myButton.Focus();

Answer 2

I'm not sure what's going on in your first dialog because it doesn't seem to be operating the way I would expect it to. The second dialog sounds more like the standard behavior.

In Windows Forms, the AcceptButton property only comes into play when pressing Enter doesn't otherwise cause any actions. In both of your examples, clicking on a button should move the focus to that button, and subsequently pressing Enter would cause another click on that button.

In any event, I think it's generally preferable to stick with the Windows user interface guidelines and not automatically change the input focus back to the OK button. If the user clicks on one of the other buttons, the focus should stay there until they move it.