Drawing shapes in an edit control

Read the question carefully.
Understand that English isn't everyone's first language so be lenient of bad spelling and grammar.
If a question is poorly phrased then either ask for clarification, ignore it, or edit the question and fix the problem. Insults are not welcome.
Don't tell someone to read the manual. Chances are they have and don't get it. Provide an answer or move on to the next question.

Let's work to help developers, not make them feel stupid.

This content, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)

Andy Bantly · Answer 1 · 2012-11-07T15:38:00

Derive a custom control from a CEdit and then implement OnPaint

You'll get something like the following where you will use your paint dc for drawing shapes...

C#

class CShapeEdit : public CEdit
{
    DECLARE_DYNAMIC(CShapeEdit)

public:
    CShapeEdit();
    virtual ~CShapeEdit();

protected:
    DECLARE_MESSAGE_MAP()
    afx_msg void OnPaint();
};

BEGIN_MESSAGE_MAP(CShapeEdit, CEdit)
    ON_WM_PAINT()
END_MESSAGE_MAP()

IMPLEMENT_DYNAMIC(CShapeEdit, CEdit)

CShapeEdit::CShapeEdit()
{
}

CShapeEdit::~CShapeEdit()
{
}

void CShapeEdit::OnPaint()
{
	CPaintDC dc(this); // device context for painting
	// TODO: Add your message handler code here
	// Do not call CEdit::OnPaint() for painting messages
}

Now in your dialog class, which hosts the custom edit control, you add a member variable

CShapeEdit m_ShapeEdit;

In the implementation of your dialog class bind it to the UI using DDX

DDX_Control(pDX, IDC_SHAPE_EDIT, m_ShapeEdit);

Then later on cause it to redraw itself with

m_ShapeEdit.RedrawWindow();

Now you have a canvas with which to explore the Win32 GDI!!!!

Eugen Podsypalnikov · Answer 2 · 2012-11-01T02:10:00

If it is enough to draw only on the some left and/or right parts of the control,
you could use CYourEdit::SetMargins(uiLeftUntouchedPixels, uiRightUntouchedPixels)
to prevent the CEdit-content painting there, even in the edit-caret mode.
Then you could also add(at or after the creating) the WS_CLIPCHILDREN style to CYourEdit control
and place some owner-drawn CYourShapeStatic child-control(s) onto the "freed" area(s) :)

Zerr0cool wrote:
I want to draw rectangles, circles in the Edit control where the user types in.

Try to set your control in the transparent mode as shown here[^]
and then to draw the shapes on the parent's surface, "behind" the control :)

Drawing shapes in an edit control

2 solutions

Solution 2

Solution 1

Add your solution here

Preview 0