Text Box Tabbing not working in Enterprise Architect add-in

Question

How can I set up tabbing in a windows form where the number of text boxes to tab through is dynamic (depending on previous user input)?

What I'm doing now

This creates the text boxes just fine, but I cannot tab through them. Note: numStates is an int that is inputed by the user in a previous form.

UPDATE : I've isolated just this code and tested it in VS 2010 and the tabbing works, but in my final version it does not. (See Background.)

BACKGROUND : This is used in an add-in for Enterprise Architect (EA). I'm deploying the add-in through a .msi installer and testing the final installation within EA and the tabbing does not work. I'm guessing now that there's some incompatibility with tabbing in a form created by an EA add-in??

System.Windows.Forms.TextBox[] textBoxes = new System.Windows.Forms.TextBox[numStates];
for (int index = 0; index < textBoxes.Length; index++)
{
    textBoxes[index] = new System.Windows.Forms.TextBox();
    textBoxes[index].Location = new System.Drawing.Point(126, yLocation);
    textBoxes[index].Name = "stateName" + index;
    textBoxes[index].Size = new System.Drawing.Size(161, 20);
    textBoxes[index].TabStop = true;
    textBoxes[index].TabIndex = index;
    this.Controls.Add(textBoxes[index]);
    textBoxes[0].Focus();
    yLocation += 25;
}

What I've looked at

c# windows form Tab Order

How to detect tab key pressing in C#?

• The answers to the above two influenced what I'm doing now. I'm attempting to set the tab order programmatically.

Adding Event Handler for Dynamically Created to window Form

• I don't think I can do this because there's no "_CheckedChanged" for text boxes and I only want to change when they press tab.

Answer 1

This seems to work just fine in Visual Studio 2013. Not sure which version you are using. I would suggest removing the AcceptsTab. That usually means (for RichTextBoxes at least), that the control will intercept the tab and insert a series of spaces, instead of jumping to the next tab stop. See code below:

• Notice I took out the line: textBoxes[index].AcceptsTab = true;

• Notice I added: this.Controls.Add(textBoxes[index]); ( Not sure if you're already addressing this )

    int numStates = 5; int yLocation = 0; System.Windows.Forms.TextBox[] textBoxes = new System.Windows.Forms.TextBox[numStates]; for (int index = 0; index < textBoxes.Length; index++) { textBoxes[index] = new System.Windows.Forms.TextBox(); textBoxes[index].Location = new System.Drawing.Point(126, yLocation); textBoxes[index].Name = "stateName" + index; textBoxes[index].Size = new System.Drawing.Size(161, 20); textBoxes[index].TabStop = true; textBoxes[index].TabIndex = index; this.Controls.Add(textBoxes[index]); textBoxes[0].Focus(); yLocation += 25; } 

Also wanted to point out that while there is a LostFocus event on a TextBox Control, which can be used like the following:

    textBoxes[index].LostFocus += Form1_LostFocus;

And handled thusly:

    void Form1_LostFocus(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        MessageBox.Show("Lost Focus From: " + ((Control)sender).Name);
    }

Answer 2

The following would be a bit of a hack, but it should work:

    private int numStates = 5;
    private void Form1_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {            
        int yLocation = 0;
        System.Windows.Forms.TextBox[] textBoxes = new System.Windows.Forms.TextBox[numStates];
        for (int index = 0; index < textBoxes.Length; index++)
        {
            textBoxes[index] = new System.Windows.Forms.TextBox();
            textBoxes[index].Location = new System.Drawing.Point(126, yLocation);
            textBoxes[index].Name = "stateName" + index;
            textBoxes[index].Size = new System.Drawing.Size(161, 20);
            textBoxes[index].AcceptsTab = true;
            textBoxes[index].TabStop = false;
            textBoxes[index].TabIndex = index;

            textBoxes[index].KeyPress += Form1_KeyPress; //Added line

            this.Controls.Add(textBoxes[index]);
            textBoxes[0].Focus();                
            yLocation += 25;                
        }            
    }
    void Form1_KeyPress(object sender, KeyPressEventArgs e)
    {
        if(e.KeyChar == '\t')
        {
            int currentState = int.Parse(((Control)sender).Name.Replace("stateName", ""));
            if(currentState == numStates - 1)
            {
                this.Controls["stateName" + (0).ToString()].Focus();
            }
            else
            {
                this.Controls["stateName" + (currentState + 1).ToString()].Focus();
            }
        }
    }

Note that I moved numStates outside to mimic that it is user input. Also, I set TabStop to false, just to ensure that the windows event doesn't fire in different environments, as it is now being handled by the KeyPress event.