.NET splitter control display

Question

Hey,

I created a Winform in VB.NET, and I added a Splitter control to allow resizing of panels during runtime.

My issue is that the splitter control is not apparent. I would like to make it appear in a way that the user would know the form can be resized. At the moment, I basically just changed the color, but I don't like how that looks.

Can anyone tell me the proper way to use this control, so that users will understand immediately that the panels are resizable?

Answer 1

Okay,

I guess if I set the Panels to have a border, it looks like the panels can resize.

I didn't have a border set, therefore the splitter was not visible.

Answer 2

I was just about to suggest the border trick (that you posted yourself). Another thing that I usually do is that I hook up event handler for the MouseEnter and MouseLeave events for the Splitter control, and add this code there:

private void Splitter_MouseEnter(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    ((Splitter)sender).BackColor = SystemColors.ControlDark;
}

private void Splitter_MouseLeave(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    ((Splitter)sender).BackColor = SystemColors.Control;
}

That way the Splitter "lights up" (or rather, shadows down...) when the mouse passes it, drawing attention to that there is a control that you can interact with there.

Answer 3

You can set the SplitterWidth property to a greater value to make it more visible.

You could also change the mouse cursor when the mouse is over the Splitter control. A similar idea is to show a tooltiptext when the mouse is over the control.