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Visual Styles

Windows visual styles can be enabled or disabled for desktop PPJ controls by setting SalApplication.VisualStyles to true or false in the Main method when the application starts up.

The following are historical WinForms/Common Controls observations from XP-era migrations. Re-test them on the supported Windows and PPJ versions rather than treating them as universal behavior:

  • ListBox control generates the LBN_SELCHANGE notification when the mouse is clicked on the empty area. Therefore, with XP styles on, ListBox controls in ported applications receive a SAM_Click event when clicked on the empty area.
  • The TabControl used in SalQuickTabs, which is the native .NET TabControl that wraps Windows Common Controls, does not support the owner draw mode when XP styles are turned on, therefore disabled tabs cannot be painted as disabled. Additionally, if the orientation of the tabs is different from Top, the tabs are drawn in standard mode because XP does not support painting the tabs in any other orientation.
  • Buttons that should not get the focus, typically on a toolbar, do get the focus anyway when XP styles are turned on.
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The SalApplication.VisualStyles flag can be overridden by using the startup switches /xp or /noxp or /visualstyles=on|off.

Target and Accessibility Checks​

These Windows settings do not control PPJ Web themes. For web styling use Skins and Themes. For desktop changes, test keyboard focus, disabled controls, high contrast, and display scaling in addition to appearance.