Embed a Progressbar in your Statusbar

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Introduction

This is a relatively short article about embedding a progressbar in the statusbar. I have read many different implementations of this idea but they are usually to complicated for such an easy task. I will explain how I do it with a minimum of coding effort.

Sub Classing

Sub Classing is the key to most every custom component. A sub classed control is merely a class that inherits from an existing control. Three is already a perfectly good statusbar control and already a perfectly good progressbar all we have to do is combined the two. So lets start by creating a class that inherits from statusbar.

Public Class ProgressStatus : Inherits StatusBar
End Class

Just by doing this you have created a copy of the statusbar control.

Adding the ProgressBar

Now that we have a control that behaves exactly like the statusbar we can add other control to our new statusbar.

Public Class ProgressStatus : Inherits StatusBar
    Public progressBar As New progressBar    

      
    Sub New()
        progressBar.Hide()

        Me.Controls.Add(progressBar)
    End Sub
End Class

Now we have created a progressbar in out statusbar control. Now all that remains to be done is position the progressbar in the correct place.

Positioning the new control

For this we need a variable that will specify the panel where the statusbar is positioned, so lets create one.

Public Class ProgressStatus : Inherits StatusBar
    Public progressBar As New progressBar
    Private _progressBar As Integer = -1    

  
    Sub New()
        progressBar.Hide()

        Me.Controls.Add(progressBar)
    End Sub

Now we need a property to set the position of the progressbar.

Public Property setProgressBar() As Integer
    Get
        Return _progressBar
    End Get
    Set(ByVal Value As Integer)
        _progressBar = Value
        Me.Panels(_progressBar).Style = StatusBarPanelStyle.OwnerDraw
    End Set
End Property

What we do here is set the style of the panel you send the property to OwnerDraw. We do this so we can access the X and Y information of where the panel is located. Now all that we have to do is create the OwnerDraw handler and tell it to position our progressbar there.

    Private Sub Reposition(ByVal sender As Object, _
      ByVal sbdevent As System.Windows.Forms.StatusBarDrawItemEventArgs) _
      Handles MyBase.DrawItem

        progressBar.Location = New Point(sbdevent.Bounds.X, _
           sbdevent.Bounds.Y)
        progressBar.Size = New Size(sbdevent.Bounds.Width, _
           sbdevent.Bounds.Height)
        progressBar.Show()
    End Sub
End Class

As you can see we never actually draw anything all we do is reposition the progressbar. We are all done!

Completed Code

Public Class ProgressStatus : Inherits StatusBar
    Public progressBar As New progressBar
    Private _progressBar As Integer = -1


    Sub New()
        progressBar.Hide()

        Me.Controls.Add(progressBar)
    End Sub


    Public Property setProgressBar() As Integer
        Get
            Return _progressBar
        End Get
        Set(ByVal Value As Integer)
            _progressBar = Value
            Me.Panels(_progressBar).Style = StatusBarPanelStyle.OwnerDraw
        End Set
    End Property


    Private Sub Reposition(ByVal sender As Object, _
         ByVal sbdevent As System.Windows.Forms.StatusBarDrawItemEventArgs) _
         Handles MyBase.DrawItem
        progressBar.Location = New Point(sbdevent.Bounds.X, _
           sbdevent.Bounds.Y)
        progressBar.Size = New Size(sbdevent.Bounds.Width, _
           sbdevent.Bounds.Height)
        progressBar.Show()
    End Sub
End Class

Using this control

Adding it to your project is easy, for easy access we will put in in its own sub.

Public StatusBar As New ProgressStatus


Private Sub InitializeStatusBar()
    Dim info = New System.Windows.Forms.StatusBarPanel
    Dim progress = New System.Windows.Forms.StatusBarPanel


    info.Text = "Ready"
    info.Width = 100

    progress.AutoSize = _
       System.Windows.Forms.StatusBarPanelAutoSize.Spring

    With StatusBar
        .Panels.Add(info)
        .Panels.Add(progress)
        .ShowPanels = True
        .setProgressBar = 1
        .progressBar.Minimum = 0
        .progressBar.Maximum = 100
    End With

    Me.Controls.Add(StatusBar)
End Sub

Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
      ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
    InitializeStatusBar()
    StatusBar.progressBar.Value = 50
End Sub

Thats it!, enjoy!