VS.Net Designer support for Layered UI

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The download is a Zip of a VS.NET solution containing

• A c# library providing a Layered UI system including designer support
• A sample c# Windows Forms app making use of the library

1. Create a LayerProvider for controls

       //inside InitializeComponent()
       ControlLayerProvider layer = new ControlLayerProvider(this.components);
   

2. Provide layer names

       //by default layers provide three layer names "Beginner" "Advanced" "Expert"
       //we can override them
       layer.Layers.Clear();
       layer.Layers.AddRange(new string[] {"Dumberer", "Dumber", "Dumb"});    
   

3. Add controls to the Layer system

       Control c;
       
       c = new Button();
       c.Text = "I am a button";
       layer.SetLayer(c, "Dumber");
       this.Controls.Add(c);
       
       c = new TextBox();
       c.Text = "I am a TextBox";
       layer.SetLayer(c, "Dumberer");
       this.Controls.Add(c);    
   

4. Or remove controls from the Layer system

       layer.SetLayer(c, null);
       //both the same thing
       layer.UnSetLayer(c);
   

5. Now that we are all nicely setup we can switch layers to switch UI

       layer.Layer = "Dumb";
       //note this sets layer.LayerLevel to 2 because "Dumb" is at index 2 in layer.Layers
   

   Or we can cycle through our layers

       layer.LayerLevel = 0;
       //or
       layer.LayerLevel++;
       //note layer.Layer maps to layer.Layers[layer.LayerLevel]
       //note layer.LayerLevel cannot be set to outside the range 0 to layer.Layers.Count-1 (inclusive)
       //the only exception is when layer.Layer.Count == 0 then it is always 0 and layer.Layers returns null
   

Download the code Here