Dialogs

A dialog or dialog box is a tool we can use in Windows programming to perform any of several common tasks. Most of these are familiar to any Windows user. These are "pop-up" controls; we create them in a method (probably an event handler), the dialog box appears, the user interacts with it, and it disappears at the end of the scope.

A dialog box is normally a modal dialog, that is, while it is in use, the rest of the form is rendered inactive.

Some of these are:

• Open File Dialog

  We can search through the file system for the file we want. The file name (including the path) is returned as the FileName property of the dialog.

• Save File Dialog

  This is similar. We can specify the file name to use in saving a file. The file name (including the path) is returned as the FileName property of the dialog.

• Print Dialog

  This allows us to select a printer from those available and choose options such as double-sided or signle-sided printing.

• Font Dialog

  This allows us to choose a font from among those installed on the local system and select the font size, the foreground color and effects such as bold, underlined, strikeover and italics. The font and color are returned as properties of the dialog.

• Color Dialog

  This enables us to select a color from a displayed list of predefined (named) colors or create our own by specifying RGB values. The color selected is returned as the Color method of the dialog.

Each of these is defined in a class and has various properties and methods.