Using a Property Sheet as your Main Window

You've seen this in Control-Panel applets, small utility programs, and even the Windows Task Manager.  A simple dialog-based program won't provide the U/I experience you want, but the document/view architecture seems too complex. To give that familiar U/I to your program, use a CPropertySheet-derived object as the main window.  Individual CPropertyPages can be used to handle various categories of settings and options, and you can provide multiple views -- real-time status, lists of objects, log of activities, etc. -- in other pages.  Each page is effectively a dialog box (a "form") so you have great flexibility in your U/I design.

In this article, I'll describe what you need to do to create this type of program, and I'll throw in a few tips and tricks that are handy to know in this scenario:  We'll get rid of the Apply and Help buttons and enable minimize/restore functionality.  Here we go.

1

In Visual Studio,
Create Project...
Project Type: VisualC++ / MFC
     Template: MFC Application
          Name: MyProg
Click [Next], then..
Application Type: Dialog-based
[Finish]

2

Create some PropertyPages
In the Resource View...
Right-click My Prog
Select Add > Resource
Click on Dialog to open it up.
Select IDD_PROPPAGE_LARGE
Click [New]
In the Dialog Editor, set
Caption: General
          ID: IDD_PgGeneral

Add some Controls:

3

Create a CPropertyPage-derived object for that property page:
In the Dialog Editor, double-click on the title bar of the property page to bring up the Class Wizard. Set...
Class Name: CPgGeneral
 Base Class: CPropertyPage

4

Repeat steps 2 and 3 for each property page

5

Open up the application main CPP file ( MyProg.cpp)
Add these #include lines at the top:

#include "PgGeneral.h"
                      #include "PgSettings.h"
                      #include "PgActivityLog.h"
                      

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Now, locate the InitInstance() function, and near the bottom of it, replace the key start-up sequence as follows:

// replace these lines
                      //	CMyProgDlg dlg;             
                      //	m_pMainWnd = &dlg;
                      //	INT_PTR nResponse = dlg.DoModal();
                      // ... with these
                      
                      	CPropertySheet cSheet( L"WonderProg" );
                      	CPgGeneral     cPgGeneral;
                      	CPgSettings    cPgSettings;
                      	CPgActivityLog cPgActivityLog;
                      
                      	cSheet.AddPage( &cPgGeneral );
                      	cSheet.AddPage( &cPgSettings );
                      	cSheet.AddPage( &cPgActivityLog );
                      
                      	int nResponse= cSheet.DoModal(); // run your entire program
                      	if (nResponse == IDOK)
                            ... etc...
                      

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You now have a program that has a PropertySheet as its main window.  You can delete the two files MyProgDlg.cpp and MyProgDlg.h and you can remove the resource IDD_MYPROG_DIALOG
But Wait! There's More!

We used CPropertySheet's default functionality, but you will want make a few adjustments because this is your main window and you want want to exert some control over various aspects of the User Interface.

Get Rid of the Help and Apply Buttons
==============================
For instance, let's say that you want to get rid of the "Help" and "Apply" buttons.  We'll derive a class that does that:

1

In the Class View...
Right-click MyProg
Select Add > Class
Choose MFC Class
Click [Add]

2

In Class Wizard,
Class Name: CSheetMain
 Base class: CPropertySheet
[Finish]

3

Right-click the SheetMain item in the Class View
Choose Properties
Click the diamond-shaped Overrides icon.
Click OnInitDialog and choose <Add OnInitDialog>
Put this code into your CSheetMain::OnInitDialog() function:

BOOL CSheetMain::OnInitDialog()
                      {
                          BOOL bResult = CPropertySheet::OnInitDialog();
                      
                          //----------------- Some setup for the PropertySheet buttons
                      
                          GetDlgItem(IDHELP)->ShowWindow(SW_HIDE); // so wonderful, no help is needed!
                      
                          //----------------- move the two remaining buttons to the right
                          CRect rcBtn, rcDlg;
                          GetWindowRect( &rcDlg );    
                      
                          CButton* pBtn= (CButton*)GetDlgItem( IDCANCEL );
                          pBtn->GetWindowRect( &rcBtn );
                          ScreenToClient( &rcBtn );
                          int nOffset= (rcDlg.Width()-12)- rcBtn.right;
                          rcBtn.OffsetRect(nOffset,0);
                          pBtn->MoveWindow( &rcBtn, TRUE /*fRepaint*/ ); 
                      	
                          pBtn= (CButton*)GetDlgItem( IDOK );
                          pBtn->GetWindowRect( &rcBtn );
                          ScreenToClient( &rcBtn );
                          rcBtn.OffsetRect(nOffset,0);
                          pBtn->MoveWindow( &rcBtn, TRUE /*fRepaint*/ ); 
                      
                          return bResult;
                      }
                      

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And modify your constructor to be:

CSheetMain::CSheetMain(LPCTSTR pszCaption, CWnd* pParentWnd, UINT iSelectPage)
                      	:CPropertySheet(pszCaption, pParentWnd, iSelectPage)
                      {
                          m_psh.dwFlags |= PSH_NOAPPLYNOW ;
                          m_psh.dwFlags &= ~PSH_HASHELP; 
                      }
                      

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4

Next, go back to MyProg.cpp and set it to use the derived object rather than the base object:

#include "SheetMain.h" // at the top and...
                      ...
                          // ...in InitInstance()
                          CSheetMain  cSheet( L"WonderProg" );   
                          //CPropertySheet cSheet( L"WonderProg" );
                      

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Enable Your App to Minimize to the Taskbar
===================================
Since this is your main window, you will want to let your user minimize it normally --  so that it will show an icon in the Taskbar, just like a real program!  It's not particularly obvious how to do that, so here's the trick.  First, change the CSheetMain() constructor like this:

CSheetMain::CSheetMain(LPCTSTR pszCaption, CWnd* pParentWnd, UINT iSelectPage)
                      	:CPropertySheet(pszCaption, pParentWnd, iSelectPage)
                      {
                          HICON hIcon= AfxGetApp()->LoadIcon(IDR_MAINFRAME);
                          m_psh.hIcon= hIcon;
                          m_psh.dwFlags |= PSH_NOAPPLYNOW |PSH_USEHICON ;
                          m_psh.dwFlags &= ~PSH_HASHELP; 
                      }
                      

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That gives your program an icon to display on the title bar and in the taskbar when it's minimized.  Now to enable the Minimize/Restore functionality, add this code to the bottom of your CSheetMain::OnInitDialog() function:

    CMenu* pSysMenu = GetSystemMenu( FALSE );
                          pSysMenu->AppendMenu(MF_STRING, SC_MINIMIZE , L"Minimize");
                          pSysMenu->AppendMenu(MF_STRING, SC_RESTORE  , L"Restore");
                      
                          ModifyStyle( 0, WS_MINIMIZEBOX  );
                      

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The finished product is illustrated by Fig 1.1 at the top of this article.

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