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Asked: 2026-05-11T02:16:58+00:00

I have a form with 3 panels, the panels are created because at certain

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I have a form with 3 panels, the panels are created because at certain times I need certain groups of controls hidden/shown. Until now, it worked fine – that is until I was asked to have a specific way to navigate the form with TAB key.

First of all, I noticed that there is no TabIndex property in the Panel object and, most importantly, I don’t want to follow a nested navigation algorithm, I just want to set my own sequence.

From what I have read online so far, this is not possible with panels. My only alternative is to put all the controls on the form in the same panel.

Any thoughts? I don’t feel like re-arranging the app, and start hiding and showing individual controls.

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1 Answer

  1. Pressing the TAB key will move the focus to the next control in the ControlCollection. Since the focus is always in a control within the Panel and not in the panel itself, how could you expect that a Panel supports tab index?

    I suggest that you think again what you are trying to do. When a specific panel is visible, TAB should navigate you around the controls in it. It doesn’t make sense for TAB to move you in the next panel. This is usually done with a button or some other control. Users expect that TAB moves the focus and not performing an action. Moreover, if you want to have TAB to move you around the panels, then you need to set the Tab Stop property of all controls to false.

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