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An Office 2003-like popup notifier

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23 Mar 2006CPOL1 min read 316K   7.1K   182   113
A nice little control to help the user notice you're trying to tell him something...

Image 1

Introduction

This is a simple project, a control that mimics the Microsoft® Outlook® 2003 mail alert.

Features

This control has several features. Among them, you'll find:

Image 2

Progressive appearance - transparency

Image 3

MSN Messenger like pop-ups (any size, color, etc.)

Image 4

Another sample

This control is 100% drawn in the code, there is absolutely no other dependencies than System.Drawing and System.Windows.Forms.

You can include a ContextMenuStrip when clicking on the "down arrow" button.

Using the code

The controls is made of two basic classes:

  • A form (the part that will actually show up).
  • A class that contains all the properties that will be includable on forms.

The class contains two timers, one used for the appearing/disappearing animation, the other (configurable) is used to define how much time the popup is shown before it disappears.

This is how the form is actually shown:

VB
fPopup.Size = Size
fPopup.Opacity = 0
fPopup.Location = _
  New Point(Screen.PrimaryScreen.WorkingArea.Right_
   - fPopup.Size.Width - 1, _
   Screen.PrimaryScreen.WorkingArea.Bottom)
fPopup.Show()

The form is does the drawing in the Paint event.

I'm using these functions to obtain a color that is similar but lighter/darker. There might exist another method.

VB
Private Function GetDarkerColor(ByVal Color As Color) As Color
    Dim clNew As Color
    clNew = Drawing.Color.FromArgb(255, DedValueMin0(CInt(Color.R), _
            Parent.GradientPower), DedValueMin0(CInt(Color.G), _
            Parent.GradientPower), DedValueMin0(CInt(Color.B), _
            Parent.GradientPower))
    Return clNew
End Function

And to avoid flickering...

VB
Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.OptimizedDoubleBuffer, True)
Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.ResizeRedraw, True)
Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.AllPaintingInWmPaint, True)

Points of Interest

None really, it's nice, it's fun, it's colorful... that's it :)

History

  • March 2006 - V 1.0.

License

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


Written By
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Switzerland Switzerland
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Comments and Discussions

 
AnswerRe: Opacity Problem with multiple stacking popups Pin
fperugini13-Apr-07 7:16
fperugini13-Apr-07 7:16 
GeneralMultiple Highlight Lines Pin
b00tleg22-Mar-07 9:38
b00tleg22-Mar-07 9:38 
AnswerRe: Multiple Highlight Lines Pin
Nicolas Wälti22-Mar-07 22:34
Nicolas Wälti22-Mar-07 22:34 
GeneralRe: Multiple Highlight Lines Pin
b00tleg23-Mar-07 7:04
b00tleg23-Mar-07 7:04 
GeneralRe: Multiple Highlight Lines Pin
Honey Arora23-May-07 19:29
Honey Arora23-May-07 19:29 
GeneralC# version Pin
Ambili_T21-Mar-07 22:23
Ambili_T21-Mar-07 22:23 
AnswerRe: C# version Pin
LittleWhiteDog22-Mar-07 21:33
LittleWhiteDog22-Mar-07 21:33 
QuestionHowto move the popup with the grip? Pin
LittleWhiteDog14-Mar-07 5:32
LittleWhiteDog14-Mar-07 5:32 
AnswerRe: Howto move the popup with the grip? Pin
Nicolas Wälti15-Mar-07 2:42
Nicolas Wälti15-Mar-07 2:42 
QuestionRe: Howto move the popup with the grip? [modified] Pin
LittleWhiteDog21-Mar-07 5:20
LittleWhiteDog21-Mar-07 5:20 
QuestionExtract the image Pin
LittleWhiteDog13-Mar-07 22:54
LittleWhiteDog13-Mar-07 22:54 
AnswerRe: Extract the image Pin
Nicolas Wälti15-Mar-07 2:41
Nicolas Wälti15-Mar-07 2:41 
NewsRe: Extract the image [modified] Pin
LittleWhiteDog15-Mar-07 23:22
LittleWhiteDog15-Mar-07 23:22 
Questionediting the dll file?!? Pin
thebirdman19849-Mar-07 1:45
thebirdman19849-Mar-07 1:45 
AnswerRe: editing the dll file?!? Pin
thebirdman19849-Mar-07 3:35
thebirdman19849-Mar-07 3:35 
AnswerRe: editing the dll file?!? Pin
Nicolas Wälti15-Mar-07 2:39
Nicolas Wälti15-Mar-07 2:39 
GeneralThe popup only fires in form load. Pin
astanton197821-Feb-07 2:06
astanton197821-Feb-07 2:06 
GeneralRe: The popup only fires in form load. Pin
astanton197821-Feb-07 4:05
astanton197821-Feb-07 4:05 
GeneralPort code to VS .NET Pin
utstudent26-Jan-07 16:37
utstudent26-Jan-07 16:37 
GeneralRe: Port code to VS .NET Pin
waltersenekal19-Feb-07 3:51
waltersenekal19-Feb-07 3:51 
GeneralRe: Port code to VS .NET Pin
utstudent19-Feb-07 14:44
utstudent19-Feb-07 14:44 
QuestionYes No Replies Pin
davidswift12-Jan-07 4:28
davidswift12-Jan-07 4:28 
AnswerRe: Yes No Replies Pin
Nicolas Wälti15-Jan-07 19:57
Nicolas Wälti15-Jan-07 19:57 
QuestionUse in Threads Pin
K32127-Nov-06 11:57
K32127-Nov-06 11:57 
GeneralAvoid losing focus when popup appears Pin
calis online15-Oct-06 23:12
calis online15-Oct-06 23:12 

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