Say, I have a WPF program with a Windows Forms control in "WindowsFormsHost" on some of its windows.
I use that program via Remote Desktop.
How will this control's graphics remote? Via GDI instructions as if it was WinForms app or as plain bitmaps like WPF does?
Created a test. So, it remotes as GDI, very fast.
Related
From MSDN article I found out that WinForm controls can be hosted in a WPF application using HwndHost.
Also, from other internet resources, I found that WPF is rendered using DirectX and WinForm is rendered using GDI+.
My question is, what renders a WinForm control when the WinForm control is drawn in a WPF application; DirectX, GDI+, or both?
I have very little experience with both technologies and making baby steps.
Thank you
You are incorrect about requiring a HwndHost to display a Windows Forms control in a WPF Application. The article that you were reading is for Win32 Interoperation, not for Windows Forms. To use a Windows Forms control in a WPF Application, you should use the WindowsFormsHost Class.
As for what will render the Windows Forms control, you need to understand something. WPF uses a totally different graphics system to Windows Forms. From the WPF Graphics Rendering Overview page on MSDN:
One of the keys to understanding the role of the Visual object is to understand the difference between immediate mode and retained mode graphics systems. A standard Win32 application based on GDI or GDI+ uses an immediate mode graphics system. This means that the application is responsible for repainting the portion of the client area that is invalidated, due to an action such as a window being resized, or an object changing its visual appearance.
In contrast, WPF uses a retained mode system. This means application objects that have a visual appearance define a set of serialized drawing data. Once the drawing data is defined, the system is responsible thereafter for responding to all repaint requests for rendering the application objects. Even at run time, you can modify or create application objects, and still rely on the system for responding to paint requests. The power in a retained mode graphics system is that drawing information is always persisted in a serialized state by the application, but rendering responsibility left to the system.
Therefore in general, the WPF Rendering system will render the WindowsFormsHost, although you may find that Windows Forms does actually perform some rendering of its own on the Windows Forms control.
You need to understand WPF and Win32 Interoperation, it show how controls are plotted.
On the other hand Technology Regions Overview explains the relationship between Wind32, WPF and DirectX.
Hope it will make you more clear about this..!!!
I got a silverlight sample from http://gallery.expression.microsoft.com/ like the analog clock and the progress bar. I am making a wpf desktop application using microsoft blend 4. My problem is how to put/run/embed the sample in my wpf application using the blend 4.
I choose wpf application because I can add windows/form and the codes are almost the same with the windows application form.
and if silverlight is not possible to run in wpf application, can you suggest how to do layered controls? My plan is to run first the loading bar. and then hide it to show the main menu and the analog clock.
Silverlight is very-very-very compact version of WPF functionality.
You can just rewrite sample to WPF and it will run more efficient.
Silverlight is just like adobe flex which helps in making(running) web browser apps..
If you use silverlight in your wpf application , then you have to use webbrowser control..
For knowledge:
When we want to try to bring wpf for webbrowser apps we use silverlight..
& doing vice versa(like you are doing), don't make much sense..
I want to integrate two existing applications into one. One of those apps is built on Windows Forms and the other on WPF.
Is it possible to achieve this?
WPF supplies the WindowsFormsHost class that allows you to host WinForms controls inside a WPF window; conversely, WinForms supplies ElementHost that allows you to host WPF controls inside a form.
Unfortunately how well things work out is highly dependent on exactly what you are doing, last time I checked there were more than a few rough edges. For more information, definitely start from this MSDN page.
If you want to have "independent" WPF windows and WinForms forms inside the same application, you will have to make both frameworks "share" some code in your UI thread's message loop. For a primer on how to do that, see here.
There are various classes to help you with this.
For hosting Windows Forms controls in a WPF Window, you can use the WindowsFormsHost class. For hosting WPF Controls in a Windows Forms Window, you can use the ElementHost class.
You can look here for mor information on the subject (windows forms section):
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms753178.aspx
My fairly large WinForm application needs a GUI overhaul, but I can't afford to do it all at once. I need to know if I can slowly add WPF into it, and if so, how?
Can I add WPF dialogs?
Can I add WPF 'panels' within a WinForm so that I can embed WPF elements?
EDIT
Can I do the opposite and put WinForm dialogs in my WPF application?
Yes, you can host WPF controls in your WinForms applications:
Walkthrough: Hosting a 3-D WPF Composite Control in Windows Forms
Walkthrough: Hosting a Composite WPF Control in Windows Forms
Yep, I've successfully mixed winforms and WPF. I even managed to add WPF windows to win32 apps, changed this app to a dll and used a WPF app to show win32 windows which show WPF windows.
To host WPF windows in WinForm or win32 apps you will need this line befor you .Show() your WpfWindow:
System.Windows.Forms.Integration.ElementHost.EnableModelessKeyboardInterop(myWpfWindow);
See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa348549.aspx
You can use the ElementHost control found in the System.Windows.Forms.Integration namespace. You will need a reference to the WindowsFormsIntegration assembly (in WindowsFormsIntegration.dll)
This control is an empty container into which you can put WPF controls e.g.
myElementHost.Child = someWpfControl;
You can find it in your toolbox and drag and drop it onto a winform like any other control;
Is it possible to have a project containing both Winforms and WPF?
Say a WinForm project that is transformed step by step(form by form) in a WPF one, will be possible to have a Winform opening on a button, and a WPF one opening on a other button?
Yes. You have to pick one technology to display each physical window and control in your app, but there's no reason why you can't mix and match.
For example:
A WinForms window can show a WPF window.
A WPF window can show a WinForms window.
A WinForms window can contain WPF content (see the ElementHost control).
A WPF window can contain WinForms controls (see the WindowsFormsHost control).
This works great.
One can have WPF windows in Windows Forms and Windows Forms windows in WPF
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms745781.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.windows.forms.integration.windowsformshost.aspx
Adding Winforms to WPF projects can be done smoothly (directly from the "Add new item" menu), but there is not straight option to add a WPF window to a Winforms project. Still, I handled to do it following these steps:
Add a WPF User Control (this option is available on the "Add new
item" menu) and then convert it into a WPF Window. Modify the XAML
changing the UserControl parent tag to Window, and remove the
inheritance from UserControl (all of this is explained in this link).
Add a reference to System.Xaml.dll. See this link.
Add a reference to System.Windows.dll (I found it on my computer on this path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework.NETFramework\v4.5. Be aware it might be different in yours). See this link.
What you might be looking for is the ElementHost control. What it lets you do is take WPF content and host it in a Windows Forms window. More details are here:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms745781.aspx
There is also a control that lets you do the reverse: host Windows Forms content from within WPF:
http://nayyeri.net/host-windows-forms-controls-in-wpf
Between the two, you can move the 'dividing line' between WPF and Windows Forms with some degree of flexibility.
There is at one caveat you'll need to keep in mind. Windows Forms works internally in terms of HWND's... a window managed by the legacy Windows window manager (which handles the z-order). WPF doesn't do this... A WPF tree is typically rendered into a single HWND', and it's WPF that manages things like z-order. What this means to you is that z-order doesn't always work the way you expect it to, and there are things you can't do with hosted Windows Forms controls that you can do with traditional WPF elements. (There is actually a way to solve this, but it involves periodically rendering the HWND into a memory bitmap, rendering that bitmap into a WPF surface, and then redirecting events directed to the WPF surface to the underlying HWND. This is powerful, but tricky and difficult to get right.)
I see no objection to do that.(I have in WinForms Application WPF windows)
Many of the examples used MessageBox.Show which is part of the Windows.Forms.
Of course you must rewrite all windows, not only controls.