.net - Save and Restore Form Position and Size

Question

In a WinForms 2.0 C# application, what is the typical method used for saving and restoring form position and size in an application?

Related, is it possible to add new User scoped application settings AT RUNTIME? I totally see how to add settings at design time, that's not a problem. But what if I want to create one at runtime?

More details:

My application is a conversion of an existing Visual FoxPro application. I've been trying to read as much as I can about application settings, user settings, etc. and get myself clear on the .Net way of doing things, but there are still several things I am confused on.

In the Fox app, saved settings are stored in the registry. My forms are subclassed, and I have base class code that automatically saves the form position and size in the registry keyed on the form name. Whenever I create a new form, I don't have to do anything special to get this behavior; it's built in to the base class. My .Net forms are also subclassed, that part is working well.

In .Net, I get the impression I'm supposed to use User scoped settings for things like user preferences. Size and location of a form definitely seem like a user preference. But, I can't see any way to automatically add these settings to the project. In other words, every time I add a new form to my project (and their are 100's of forms), I have to remember to ADD a User scoped application setting and be sure to give it the same name as the form, i.e., "FormMySpecialSizePosition" to hold the size and position. I'd rather not have to remember to do that. Is this just tough luck? Or am I totally barking up the wrong tree by trying to use User scoped settings? Do I need to create my own XML file to hold settings, so that I can do whatever I want (i.e, add a new setting at runtime)? Or something else?

Surely this is a very common and somebody can tell the "right" way to do it. Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

private void Form1_Load( object sender, EventArgs e )
{
    // restore location and size of the form on the desktop
    this.DesktopBounds =
        new Rectangle(Properties.Settings.Default.Location,
    Properties.Settings.Default.Size);
    // restore form's window state
    this.WindowState = ( FormWindowState )Enum.Parse(
        typeof(FormWindowState),
        Properties.Settings.Default.WindowState);
}

private void Form1_FormClosing( object sender, FormClosingEventArgs e )
{
    System.Drawing.Rectangle bounds = this.WindowState != FormWindowState.Normal ? this.RestoreBounds : this.DesktopBounds;
    Properties.Settings.Default.Location = bounds.Location;
    Properties.Settings.Default.Size = bounds.Size;
    Properties.Settings.Default.WindowState =
        Enum.GetName(typeof(FormWindowState), this.WindowState);
    // persist location ,size and window state of the form on the desktop
    Properties.Settings.Default.Save();
}