Tab index does not work with controls in panels?
I have a vb.net windows form with about 15 comboboxes and 15 textboxes, along with several other controls. All of these TextBoxes and ComboBoxes are located in panels. The reason for this is I need to adjust the visible property of controls based upon what the user selects/enters, so grouping each label and control together in their own panels seemed like an easy way to accomplish this.
I've set the tab order via properties, but it doesn't work. When I tab through my form, it skips around and does not follow the tab order that I've set. Is this because my controls are each located in separate panels? I've set TabStop to false for everything I don't want a tabstop on, I'm a little confused about what's going on here. It really seems that the fact that my ComboBoxes and TextBoxes are each inside their own panels is preventing my tab indices to work. Can anyone confirm this or have other ideas of what may be happening? TabIndex works if I create a new form.
Answer
Believe it or not, the panel ordering absolutely DOES affect the TabIndex. I have found that the easiest way to deal with tab ordering on a multi-panel form is to use View>Tab Order as suggested by LarsTech. Then once the tab ordering is visible, you'll be able to see how the panels affect the overall ordering of the controls contained in each panel. Next, left-click one at a time on the actual panels, in the order that you want the flow to go. You'll notice that it will then automatically sub-order the controls inside each panel, with the overall panel ordering be in the order that you specified. Once this is done you can then click on each control inside each panel to set a control's relative tab order inside a given panel.