How to create movable/resizeable/configurable Toolbars for a Windows Application

Question

I have a large C++ application with a mostly homegrown layer for GUI Abstraction etc. The application is plain C/C++ on Win32 API.

So far the application only supports a static horizontal toolbar which can not be modified in any way at runtime (besides enabling/hoovering visualization). We thought about switching to a ribbon interface but nobody we asked liked that idea.

So we want to add some sort of toolbar with the following capabilities:

Movable and resizeable (acting as floating windows/palettes)
Use Bitmaps of any Size
Supports User configured Toolbars Supports
Enabling/Disabling/Checked State
Preferably create disabled/checked/hoovering state bitmaps automatically

How can this be done with the least effort?

I looked at rebars and the TOOLBAR API. Rebars seem not to be resizeable and i was unable to find a working sample for toolbars.

Edward Clements · Accepted Answer · 2013-05-31 08:36:14Z

1

Working sample: here's what I could find: tutorial with link to full example code, part-3 covers toolbars

edited May 31, 2013 at 8:36

answered May 31, 2013 at 7:24

Edward Clements

5,1722 gold badges24 silver badges30 bronze badges

Thanks for your effort. But still this one does not seem to support resizing or moving the toolbars.
– RED SOFT ADAIR
Commented May 31, 2013 at 11:49
@REDSOFTADAIR I'll need to spend some time to patch in some code from an old application, I'll get back to you sometime in the week-end
– Edward Clements
Commented May 31, 2013 at 12:18
@REDSOFTADAIR I've gone to the oldest sources we have (from the 90's), they still have MFC -- I've also searched around in the Internet a lot, I'm afraid that docking/floating toolbars do need MFC (that sort of makes sense, the dock/float functionality is from the frame window, not the toolbar; I vaguely remember when we switched to MFC that we generated an empty application, added toolbar code to MainFrm.cpp and called our window-proc from the view's WindowProc)
– Edward Clements
Commented Jun 1, 2013 at 7:54
Thats exactly what i found: MFC supports additional TOOLBAR Features such as moving and resizing. Plain Win32 seems not to support this. Also WPF seems not to support this. Its not possible in Visual Studio 2010 to move a toolbar.
– RED SOFT ADAIR
Commented Jun 2, 2013 at 19:00

Add a comment |

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

How to create movable/resizeable/configurable Toolbars for a Windows Application

1 Answer 1

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related