The Component Tray shows icons for nonvisual items in the designer. It allows you to work with nonvisual items separately from the controls on the form or the window being designed.

Wherever this documentation refers to a Component Tray, it needs to be interpreted depending on whether you are working with a Windows Forms or a WPF project, as described below.

Windows Forms

In Windows Forms, the Component Tray is provided by Visual Studio itself. It appears at the bottom of the Windows Forms Designer, as shown on the following picture:

 

Following operations are available:

• To add an item to the component tray, drag it from the Visual Studio Toolbox to the component tray area.
• To remove an item from the component tray, select it, and press the Delete key. Alternatively, after selecting the item, invoke the Delete command from its context menu, or Edit -> Delete from the main menu.
• To view or modify properties of an item on the component tray, select the item first, and then use the Properties window of the Visual Studio.

Changes you make to the Component Tray are reflected in the code file that the Visual Studio designer generates and maintains for your form.

It is, of course, also possible to modify the generated code by hand, but we recommend against doing so unless you have a compelling reason for that, and know very well what you are doing.

WPF

Traditionally, WPF uses XAML to describe visual components only. For this reason, the WPF Designer does not show a component tray. In Live Binding for WPF, its functionality is provided by an add-on dialog, a Component Tray Editor.

In order to invoke this dialog to view or modify the items in the component tray, right-click in the design area of your WPF designer, and select the Component Tray context menu command.

Following operations are available:

• To add an item to the component tray, press the Add buton, and in the Toolbox Items dialog (see subsequent chapter), select the item and press OK.
• To remove an item from the component tray, select it in the Components list, and press the Remove button.
• To view or modify properties of an item on the component tray, select the item in the Components list first, and then use the property grid on the right hand side of the dialog.

Changes that you make to the Component Tray are reflected in the XAML code that the Visual Studio Designer generates and maintains for your window. Specifically, they are placed into the following XAML element:

    <ComponentModel:Live.ComponentBag>

In the XAML tab of the WPF designer, it is also possible to view and modify properties of component tray items in the Properties window of the Visual Studio.

It is, of course, also possible to modify the generated markup by hand, but we recommend against doing so unless you have a compelling reason for that, and know very well what you are doing.