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253

answers:

1

Putting aside the discussion of the merits of including a Tip of the Day in an application (a la Is Tip of the Day Good) I am seeking either a ready-to-go library or C# source code for a .NET tip-of-the-day dialog for an open-source project (so I am looking for an open-source component, of course). It is usually easy to locate a needed component with a direct search, but searching for "tip of the day" is an exception: most of the results, obviously, are tips rather than how to implement tips. ( It is akin to searching for help on a stack overflow problem and getting 99% of the results pointing to StackOverflow.com! :-)

I have found only one candidate thus far (Tip Of the Day Dialog). I prefer to have more than one candidate to be able to compare and contrast, and thus more readily determine the features one would want. Besides a general search, the only supplier of free components I am aware of is Devexpress but they do not have a tip component.

2010.04.29 Update:
Just to address the point from JPMarichal: yes, it is easy enough to make a component like this, but it is still reinventing the wheel and I have a passion (obsession? :-) for finding existing building blocks. The more common/widespread something is, the more reason for there to be an off-the-shelf building block.

+1  A: 

A tip of the day is just a Windows Form and a simple list or database. You may store the tips in a SQL Server compact edition database, an Access database or whatever you like. It needs just one table, a tip per row. Then use a form with a textbox and provide controls to navigate through the rows of the table. That's all.

You may, of course, configure it to display at random. Anyway, provide controls so the user may disable it if he likes.

There are not any more hassle to do the tip of the day form, it is really easy to build and because this is that there aren't too much tip of the day components. It's easier to build it yourself, then you're on the control of functionality and appeareance, at your own taste. It maybe would take less than 20 minutes to do it, or maybe you already have do it while you were reading this paragraph.

Regards.

JPMarichal
It is easy to do, agreed. But there are many things easy to do that could be made even easier. Dragging a control from the toolbox, then setting a few properties, and providing a list of tips should be all that is needed.
msorens
Yes, and if you write the dialog now, you can reuse it in all future applications in such a manner :)
Sekhat