Member Avatar for bigN

Hi,
I have a question about UI design in NET.
I am creating a scientific application with C# and VS2008. Currently I am using a tab control were till now I have 3 level tab depth (eg tab inside tab etc) which is not very convenient, nor user friendly.
I am thinking to switch to an outlook UI style were the general tabs will be moved to left panel with the form of buttons. While the right panel will have the detail form again with tabs but lesser depth.
So my question is what is the best approach of doing this?
Should I move to a MDI where in the right panel will load detail form's in full mode?
Or should I search for some specific tab component?

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Member Avatar for sknake

Check out Developer Express, they have cloned the entire office UI. Plus they have excellent support.

http://www.devexpress.com/

Member Avatar for bigN

Check out Developer Express, they have cloned the entire office UI. Plus they have excellent support.

http://www.devexpress.com/

Thanks,
You are right, there is a lot of components out there (mainly commercial) that would perform this task, however I am interested in creating one to fit my needs.
So I am trying to find here a pattern or algorithm to do so...
So my question is ... would it be better to create and load each detail form in right panel, or should I proceed with components. Where the component would be a detail form?

Member Avatar for ddanbe

Perhaps you need to use a splitcontainer control. I used one once. The left panel I filled with a treeview control, the right panel I filled with info from the item selected in the treeview.

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