Making PM system's Inbox - Dynamically link Panel controls - mysql

Question

Ignore this to get to the main problem, below is only the idea
Scenario: I am making a total Private Messaging system in Visual Basic.
Trying: I want to make an Inbox for the users. The messages will be retrieved from the MySQL database and shown in small custom Grid made with Panel(Type of Control from Visual basic) for each message which will be clickable which is when clicked, the whole message will be shown.
Did so far: Not too much though(Talking about the Inbox.), I only wrote the MySQL query.
I will make the Sending and Reading PM after the Inbox as Inbox seems more complex than the other two things.
I really want to know how can this be achieved. I searched around almost everywhere, either it was for PHP and web based or nothing. I want to know how to dynamically create controls like panels and the labels and show the PMs. Is there any other way to do this rather than showing the PMs in DataGridView ? (I really don't want to use that as it's not what I want.)
For reference: The custom Grid is something like this:
The MySQL PM table:
PMId - The ID for the message (Auto Incremented)
Sender_Name - The person sending the message
Receiver_Name - The person receiving the message
Subject - The subject of the message
Date_Sent - Date on which the message was sent
PM_Read - If the PM has been read (0 for not read, 1 for read)
Deleted - If the PM has been deleted (0 for not deleted, 1 for deleted)

Answer 1

Look at the code-behind for a built form and you will see how to create controls at run-time. For example, I created a form, added a panel with a button and label and this is the code created in the designer:
Private Sub InitializeComponent()
Me.Button1 = New System.Windows.Forms.Button()
Me.Label1 = New System.Windows.Forms.Label()
Me.Panel1 = New System.Windows.Forms.Panel()
Me.Panel1.SuspendLayout()
Me.SuspendLayout()
'
'Button1
'
Me.Button1.Location = New System.Drawing.Point(3, 3)
Me.Button1.Name = "Button1"
Me.Button1.Size = New System.Drawing.Size(75, 23)
Me.Button1.TabIndex = 0
Me.Button1.Text = "Button1"
Me.Button1.UseVisualStyleBackColor = True
'
'Label1
'
Me.Label1.AutoSize = True
Me.Label1.Location = New System.Drawing.Point(3, 29)
Me.Label1.Name = "Label1"
Me.Label1.Size = New System.Drawing.Size(39, 13)
Me.Label1.TabIndex = 1
Me.Label1.Text = "Label1"
'
'Panel1
'
Me.Panel1.Controls.Add(Me.Button1)
Me.Panel1.Controls.Add(Me.Label1)
Me.Panel1.Location = New System.Drawing.Point(12, 12)
Me.Panel1.Name = "Panel1"
Me.Panel1.Size = New System.Drawing.Size(198, 69)
Me.Panel1.TabIndex = 2
'
'Form1
'
Me.AutoScaleDimensions = New System.Drawing.SizeF(6.0!, 13.0!)
Me.AutoScaleMode = System.Windows.Forms.AutoScaleMode.Font
Me.ClientSize = New System.Drawing.Size(284, 262)
Me.Controls.Add(Me.Panel1)
Me.Name = "Form1"
Me.Text = "Form1"
Me.Panel1.ResumeLayout(False)
Me.Panel1.PerformLayout()
Me.ResumeLayout(False)
End Sub
Friend WithEvents Button1 As System.Windows.Forms.Button
Friend WithEvents Label1 As System.Windows.Forms.Label
Friend WithEvents Panel1 As System.Windows.Forms.Panel
You can do the same thing at run-time.
Dim iTop As Int32 = 5
For Each DR As DataRow In DT.Rows
Dim pnl As New Panel
pnl.Location = New System.Drawing.Point(12, iTop)
pnl.Size = New System.Drawing.Size(198, 40)
Dim lbl As New Label
lbl.Location = New System.Drawing.Point(3, 3)
lbl.Size = New System.Drawing.Size(39, 13)
lbl.Text = DR("Some field from your table")
'Add to panel
pnl.Controls.Add(lbl)
'Add to Form
Me.Controls.Add(pnl)
'Add to the top location so the next set of controls are not on top of the old ones
iTop += 50
Next