Skinning In Vb6

alo,

i've been working on an app for my job and i want to skin it with my company's colors/logo etc. does anyone know how to implement skins into a VB6 form? i've been looking over some programming forums, but a lot of them are offering activex controls with hefty $ prices. upwards of $400!!! i posted at one place, but no one has responded in a few days. i figured someone here might have a clue or could point me somewhere that would. (i would give it a panther skin myself, but that's not going to fly with my management)

btw, please don't bombard me with things like 'you should program with c++ or whatever, it has built in skin support'... i am learning other languages currently, but vb is what i know now (somewhat) and could functionally get this app done, but now i want to visually bring it to a higher level.

thanks much

#97338

You could create your own UserControls. Using VB, just add a usercontrol. It is a b*tch to get all the properties that are in the originals, but if you just need text or caption and stuff, it shouldn't be that hard.

#97339

Hey,

Are you just trying to add an image to the form or actually make it skinnable like splashpanel?

SplashPanel was created in VB6 and it has skinnability.

I could give you an old old build of Splashpanel if you want to look at the code.

#97368

i'm trying to embed the skin into the application below. i don't want it to be changed if i brought it from one computer to another. e.g. the colors, menubar, exit button, etc. all will remain however i design it. in this screenshot, it's pulling from my theme.

if you can send that to me that would be great... that's how i pretty much learned so far, just looking at examples...

(don't even ask me what all of those things on the program mean, i don't even understand completely what my company does)

#97386

If you are trying to skin the app to where it almost hides the standard windows buttons that will take some work, but it can be done. If you just want to add an image and skin a button or two i can help

#97407

thanks man....well, let me tell you what i tried, and you can tell me how wrong i did it... i search all over and found out that instead of using the standard vb style, you can implement code that will make it use the XP style instead (for like buttons, check boxes, scroll bars, etc.), but does not require XP to run of off. my company uses 2000, but it's technically supposed to let you view it like an XP program. here's the link i went off of:

http://www.freevbcode.com/ShowCode.Asp?ID=5688

that seemed to be a good building block to get a more appealing style instead of what i put in the above screenshot... the design phase went fine, but once i compiled it and tried to run the app, it gave me a run-time error about the active control, error #429. after reading about it on the net, it said that i had to have MS scripting installed, so i did that and still nothing, the same error. here's an MS article about the error:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...&NoWebContent=1

so, i spent 6 hours last night ripping that sample apart and figuring out what to do and for it to not work was a little disappointing. :cry: :rant: so if you're offering, i'm willing to take any help i can. it's going to have the same layout (as in placement of objects) of the above screenshot, my company just asked if i can pizazz it up a little... put our logo in (which i can do), and dress up the buttons, etc...

thanks much (Y)

#97744

if you can do Flash, then you can actually combine VB with Flash

Therefore, using Flash button (goodbye old square buttons) and interact with the VB forms.

Have a search on the Google for 'VB with Flash' or something like that. There are some good sites out there giving tutorials. I made an application once with VB 6 and Flash and well they look a bit better, althought not completely skinned.

Good luck!

#97785

Hey, if you just want to skin your app or add VS support try the XP Manifest Utility by beric. www.iberic.tk

#99164