How to: Align a Control to the Edges of Forms

You can make your control align to the edge of your forms by setting the Dock property. This property designates where your control resides in the form. The Dock property can be set to the following values:

Setting	Effect on your control
Bottom	Docks to the bottom of the form.
Fill	Fills all remaining space in the form.
Left	Docks to the left side of the form.
None	Does not dock anywhere, and it appears at the location specified by its Location property.
Right	Docks to the right side of the form.
Top	Docks to the top of the form.

There is design-time support for this feature in Visual Studio.

Topic	Location
How to: Create a Windows Forms Control That Takes Advantage of Design-Time Features	.NET Framework: Application Development
How to: Create a Windows Forms Control That Takes Advantage of Design-Time Features	.NET Framework: Application Development
How to: Display a Control in the Customize Toolbox Dialog Box	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Serializing Collections of Standard Types with the DesignerSerializationVisibilityAttribute	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Provide a Toolbox Bitmap for a Control	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from Existing Windows Forms Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Debugging Custom Windows Forms Controls at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the Control Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Test the Run-Time Behavior of a UserControl	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Align a Control to the Edges of Forms at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the UserControl Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Controls for Windows Forms	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Composite Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Display a Control in the Customize Toolbox Dialog Box	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Serializing Collections of Standard Types with the DesignerSerializationVisibilityAttribute	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Provide a Toolbox Bitmap for a Control	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from Existing Windows Forms Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Debugging Custom Windows Forms Controls at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the Control Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Test the Run-Time Behavior of a UserControl	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Align a Control to the Edges of Forms at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the UserControl Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Controls for Windows Forms	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Composite Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Create a Windows Forms Control That Takes Advantage of Design-Time Features	.NET Framework: Application Development
How to: Display a Control in the Customize Toolbox Dialog Box	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Serializing Collections of Standard Types with the DesignerSerializationVisibilityAttribute	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Provide a Toolbox Bitmap for a Control	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from Existing Windows Forms Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Debugging Custom Windows Forms Controls at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the Control Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Test the Run-Time Behavior of a UserControl	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Align a Control to the Edges of Forms at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the UserControl Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Controls for Windows Forms	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Composite Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the UserControl Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Create a Windows Forms Control That Takes Advantage of Design-Time Features	.NET Framework: Application Development
How to: Create a Windows Forms Control That Takes Advantage of Design-Time Features	.NET Framework: Application Development
How to: Display a Control in the Choose Toolbox Items Dialog Box	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Serializing Collections of Standard Types with the DesignerSerializationVisibilityAttribute	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Provide a Toolbox Bitmap for a Control	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from Existing Windows Forms Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Debugging Custom Windows Forms Controls at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the Control Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Test the Run-Time Behavior of a UserControl	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Align a Control to the Edges of Forms at Design Time	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Inherit from the UserControl Class	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Controls for Windows Forms	Windows Forms Controls
How to: Author Composite Controls	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Authoring a Composite Control with Visual C#	Windows Forms Controls
Walkthrough: Inheriting from a Windows Forms Control with Visual Basic	Windows Forms Controls

To set the Dock property for your control at run time

• Set the Dock property to the appropriate value in code.

  ' To set the Dock property internally.
  Me.Dock = DockStyle.Top
  ' To set the Dock property from another object.
  UserControl1.Dock = DockStyle.Top
  

  // To set the Dock property internally.
  this.Dock = DockStyle.Top;
  // To set the Dock property from another object.
  UserControl1.Dock = DockStyle.Top;
  

  // To set the Dock  property internally.
  this.set_Dock(DockStyle.Top);
  // To set the Dock property from another object.
  UserControl1.set_Dock(DockStyle.Top);
  

See Also

Tasks

How to: Anchor and Dock Child Controls in a FlowLayoutPanel Control
How to: Anchor and Dock Child Controls in a TableLayoutPanel Control

Reference

System.Windows.Forms.Control.Dock
System.Windows.Forms.Control.Anchor

Concepts

AutoSize Property Overview

Other Resources

Developing Custom Windows Forms Controls with the .NET Framework