Creating custom buttons

There are several ways to create Custom-Buttons for Windows in C++.

Here are two of the most common:

// Load Bitmap for Button
hBitmap = (HBITMAP)LoadImage (GetModuleHandle (NULL), L"BMButton.bmp", IMAGE_BITMAP, 0, 0, LR_DEFAULTCOLOR | LR_LOADFROMFILE);

// Version1: BS_BITMAP
hBButton1 = CreateWindow( TEXT("button"), TEXT(""),
          WS_CHILD | WS_VISIBLE | BS_FLAT | BS_BITMAP,
          50,50,BWIDTH,BHIGHT,  // pos x, pos y, width, height
          hwnd, (HMENU)ID_BBUTTON1,
          hInstGlobal, NULL);      // hInstGlobal see  ((LPCREATESTRUCT) lParam)->hInstance,

SendMessage(hBButton1, BM_SETIMAGE, (WPARAM)IMAGE_BITMAP, (LPARAM)(HANDLE)hBitmap);

// Version2: BS_OWNERDRAW
hBButton2 = CreateWindow(TEXT("button"),TEXT(""),
          WS_CHILD | WS_VISIBLE | BS_OWNERDRAW | BS_PUSHBUTTON,
          50,170,BWIDTH,BHIGHT,  // pos x, pos y, width, height
          hwnd,(HMENU)ID_BBUTTON2,
          hInstGlobal, NULL);
return 0 ;

Version2 is more complicate because you have to do the drawing yourself in WM_DRAWITEM.

I suggest using Version1.

there are rare information provided to say how. at least you should specify which UI framework you are using, for instance, mfc, wxwidgets..Net, GTK+, QT or anything else. different framework provides different approach for developers to create custom UI elements, however, at most cases, you just simply derived from the element the framework provide, and rewrite your own paint function or eventhandler.