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winformsmdi

Draw connector between MDI children in Windows Form

In Windows Forms, I would like to show relationships using lines to show a connection between two forms inside an MDI parent similar to MS Access' relationship diagram.

ms access relations

What are my options for drawing lines underneath the children (or on parent background)?

Solution

  • If you are going to use MDI then what you would need to do is handle the Paint event of the MdiClient control that hosts the child forms. It's not actually exposed directly but you can access is via the Controls collection of the parent form. It will be the only child control of that type and, in most cases, the only child control. You can then use GDI+ to draw lines between the appropriate pairs of forms.