Skin the ComboBox in 3 simple function calls

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• Download demo project - 27.2 Kb

Introduction

This is a simple sub classed control from CComboBox that allows you to apply skin to the combobox and its droplist. The skins used can be a pixel wide (for the background and corners of the droplist) to keep the control light.

The CComboBox overrides

The following functions are overridden (just like in most of the sub classed controls). It's all easy to understand.

virtual BOOL Create(LPCTSTR lpszClassName, 
    LPCTSTR lpszWindowName, DWORD dwStyle, 
    const RECT& rect, CWnd* pParentWnd, UINT nID, 
    CCreateContext* pContext = NULL);
virtual void DrawItem(LPDRAWITEMSTRUCT lpDrawItemStruct);

afx_msg void OnPaint();
afx_msg void OnDestroy();

afx_msg LRESULT OnCtlColorListBox(WPARAM wParam, LPARAM lParam);

The following function is taken from the multicombobox project on Code Project (sorry I forgot the author and link).

afx_msg LRESULT OnCtlColorListBox(WPARAM wParam, LPARAM lParam);

How to use

It's very simple to use. Add a combobox on the dialog box, make a member variable of CComboBox type, change the type of object to CBitComboBox in the Dialog header file, and add the bitmaps in the resource to skin the combobox.

Change the header file to look as following:

Include BitComboBox header:

#include "BitComboBox.h"

Change the control's class to CBitComboBox from CComboBox.

CBitComboBox m_cmbBitmap;

Call the following functions in CBitComboBox class to set resource IDs of the skin bitmaps on OnInitDialog (or anywhere in your project before combo box is created).

m_cmbBitmap.SetComboBitmap(IDB_COMBO_LEFT,
   IDB_COMBO_RIGHT,IDB_COMBO_CEN);
m_cmbBitmap.SetComboListBitmap(IDB_LIST_LEFT, 
   IDB_LIST_RIGHT,IDB_LIST_TOP,IDB_LIST_BOT);
m_cmbBitmap.SetHighlightColor(RGB(115,138,174), RGB(255,255,255));
m_cmbBitmap.SetNormalPositionColor(RGB(115,138,154), RGB(255,255,255));

What is missing

There are following things missing, if someone can complete them please let me know:

1. If there is no skin set a default combobox should appear (Can be done by simply calling the CComboBox functions from overrides).
2. I have not implemented the skins for edit control of combobox (Can be done in OnCtrlColor of CBitComboBox).

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