Why are some windows not expandable?

[dakotad555]

One frustration I have with Windows 7 is that it inherited the inability to re-size certain windows and forces you to use tiny scroll bars when navigating lists. These are usually linked to system settings and advanced settings. Why, in the day of cheap, large screens does Windows still default to these horrible small windows and unnecessary scroll bars that could easily be eliminated by enabling a larger window size? Even a slight increase in size would do the trick!

Here is an example of what I'm talking about:

Does anyone know of a tweak to make expanding these small windows possible?

 

[LoneEagle]

A window has an attribute like "FormBorderStyle" where the value can be "None / FixedSingle / ... / Sizable / ...". With a form like the one you provided, it would be more difficult to redistribute spaces for each tabs.

You're right. It is really frustrating where there are still Windows to small where the scrolling is too painfull.

Is there a tweak? Probably not... 🙁

 

[sminlal]

Dialog boxes like that are totally under control of the programmer. Unless the programmer has provided for a way to resize them, you're out of luck.

The new WPF (Windows Presentation Framework) and Silverlight runtime libraries make it a lot easier for programmers to write windows and dialogs that are easily resizable, so I'm optimistic that many of these types of windows will improve in the future.

 

[dakotad555]

The really stupid thing is that these boxes are Windows defaults. It means that Microsoft programmer themselves left out the ability to re-size them. And they wonder why people move to Macs? (That said, I am very much a lover of Windows 7 overall).

 

[randomizer]

.NET-built programs can resize form controls pretty well without any additional programming other than allowing the form to be expanded (which is default anyway). But remember, built-in Windows forms and dialogs are mostly C, not .NET, and MS is catering for the lowest common denominator: 800x600.