Question

I am trying to evenly space dynamically created controls by giving them a width and height that is a fraction of the width and height of the container control.

However, although my functions calculating the dimensions are correct, for some reason the assignment to the Width property is being stubbornly refused. The WidthToUse() function is returning 19, yet when an attempt is made to assign that vaue to the dynamically created TextBox, it remains at…630! Why 630 to begin with, and why does it refuse to be assigned to?

Even the height, although “working” doesn’t work quite right – there are too many controls or not enough space on the panel to accommodate all of the controls using this math.

Here’s my code:

int WidthToUse = getTextBoxWidthToUse(tableLayoutPanelGreatGooglyMoogly.Width);
int HeightToUse = getControlHeightToUse(tableLayoutPanelGreatGooglyMoogly.Height);

TextBox txtbx = new TextBox();
txtbx.Parent = tableLayoutPanelGreatGooglyMoogly;
txtbx.Margin = new Padding();
txtbx.Dock = DockStyle.Fill;
txtbx.AutoSize = false;
txtbx.Width = WidthToUse;   // WidthToUse is 19, but txtbx.Width is 630 both before AND after this assignment!
txtbx.Height = HeightToUse; // HeightToUse is 27


private static int getControlHeightToUse(int theDynPanelHeight) {
    return (theDynPanelHeight / NUMBER_OF_ROWS);
}

private static int getTextBoxWidthToUse(int theDynPanelWidth) {
    return (theDynPanelWidth / 32);
}

private static int getLabelWidthToUse(int theDynPanelWidth) {
    return ((theDynPanelWidth / 64) * 3);
}

Answer 1

DockStyle.Fill is a property describing the size of a control relative to the size of it’s container. A control will resize to fit all of the empty space in it’s parent container with this property set.