I'm sure this has been answered before, but I can't find it in the archived posts. I am new to C# and Visual Studio 2005 so my problems are probably due to that.
I've got an application that requires multiple views of user interface and data analysis (configurations, data trend plots, etc). Only one view is displayed at any given time. There are navigation buttons on each view to display any view.
I envisioned doing this Windows Forms application using either of the following ways.
Technique 1) Use multiple forms with common buttons on each form to navigate to any form. I would somehow keep each form's size and location bound together so that it has the appearance of a view change (ie., not jumping around on the screen when form visibility change).
Technique 2) Use a single form with fixed splitContainerPanels. As each button was pressed I would disable the visibility of the components of it's view and enable the components of the newly pressed button.
Do either of these techniques sound reasonable? I've attempted both without much luck. Is there a best-practice method I should use? Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated.