VB Forum / General 2 / March 2004

When you turn AutoRedraw on the UserControl ceases to receive Paint
Events

What I tend to do is to put all the drawing stuff in/under one routine
called LS_Refresh
- in the Paint event call LS_Refresh
- give the thing a Refresh property that calls LS_Refresh
- when Properties change call LS_Refresh

but have this code in LS_Refresh

   ' if Compiled (not Form design mode) then turn off Paint Events
   If UserControl.Ambient.UserMode = True Then
      If AutoRedraw = False Then
         AutoRedraw = True ' No more Paint Events - Reduce Flicker
      End If
   End If

However this is simply because I am putting AutoRedraw on at run time
in order to cut down on flicker.

If you put all your code in the Paint event and have the AutoRedraw
off, then you should be Ok
- PaintPicture does /not/ need AutoRedraw on
 (unless I'm missing something)

Here is an example of a UserControl without AutoRedraw
- I've tried putting popup menus (from right click a Textbox) over it
at run time, and it works just fine

Option Explicit

Private mPic As StdPicture
Private mCount As Long

Private Sub UserControl_Initialize()
  Set mPic = LoadPicture("c:\windows\bubbles.bmp")
  AutoRedraw = False
End Sub

Private Sub LS_Refresh()
  If Not mPic Is Nothing Then
     UserControl.PaintPicture mPic, 0, 0
  End If
  UserControl.CurrentX = 0
  UserControl.CurrentY = 0
  UserControl.ForeColor = vbRed
  UserControl.FontTransparent = True
  mCount = mCount + 1
  UserControl.Print "Hullo" + Str$(mCount)
  UserControl.Line (0, 100)-(400, 100)
End Sub

Private Sub UserControl_Paint()
  Call LS_Refresh
End Sub

=======
The only reason why I often use AutoRedraw is because I'm often
setting multiple properties, and it saves hassle if I just repaint
each time,
- although a priming Timer instead of painting works well

- and I must look at using UserControl.Refresh
 (nope - that caused flicker - but I reckon that is down to the way I
am drawing)

HTH