Winforms Auto-scaling with Localization

Question

I'm having significant issues getting Winforms (C#) auto-scaling working correctly.

First of all, it doesn't seem to even do anything across DPIs. When I create a simple application, all of the controls appear the same size on 100% and 125% DPI, however the fonts in all of my controls have been scaled up in 125% DPI. I would expect that the Form would be scaled up to allow for the larger fonts, but this is not the case. This may be due to the fact the application is not "DPI-Aware", and so it uses XP Style font scaling instead, but I'm not really sure. Here's how it looks:

Application at 100% DPI, Not Localized:

Application at 125% DPI, Not Localized:

The issues above are frustrating, but not deal breaking. Unfortunately, there is another issue. When my simple form has its "Localizable" property set to true (so all the controls' sizes and locations are stored in a resx file):

... the RichTextBox control becomes far, far too tall:

Application at 125% DPI, Localized:

Unfortunately, the application I'm working on is a very old one. It has over 500 controls/dialogs designed in Winforms, so moving to WPF is not a possibility.

So, my question is basically this: why does simply having the control locations in a resx file ruin the layout at 125% DPI? How can I fix this?

Here is the source for the above example program: [Download]

Thanks for any help!

EDIT: Here are the relevant sources:

Form1.cs

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Data;
using System.Drawing;
using System.IO;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using System.Xml.Serialization;

namespace DPITest
{
    public partial class Form1 : Form
    {
        public Form1()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
            richTextBox1.Text = richTextBox1.Size.ToString();
        }
    }
}

Form1.Designer.cs

namespace DPITest
{
    partial class Form1
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// Required designer variable.
        /// </summary>
        private System.ComponentModel.IContainer components = null;

        /// <summary>
        /// Clean up any resources being used.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="disposing">true if managed resources should be disposed; otherwise, false.</param>
        protected override void Dispose(bool disposing)
        {
            if (disposing && (components != null))
            {
                components.Dispose();
            }
            base.Dispose(disposing);
        }

        #region Windows Form Designer generated code

        /// <summary>
        /// Required method for Designer support - do not modify
        /// the contents of this method with the code editor.
        /// </summary>
        private void InitializeComponent()
        {
            System.ComponentModel.ComponentResourceManager resources = new System.ComponentModel.ComponentResourceManager(typeof(Form1));
            this.label1 = new System.Windows.Forms.Label();
            this.richTextBox1 = new System.Windows.Forms.RichTextBox();
            this.panel1 = new System.Windows.Forms.Panel();
            this.SuspendLayout();
            // 
            // label1
            // 
            resources.ApplyResources(this.label1, "label1");
            this.label1.Name = "label1";
            // 
            // richTextBox1
            // 
            resources.ApplyResources(this.richTextBox1, "richTextBox1");
            this.richTextBox1.Name = "richTextBox1";
            // 
            // panel1
            // 
            this.panel1.BackColor = System.Drawing.Color.Black;
            resources.ApplyResources(this.panel1, "panel1");
            this.panel1.Name = "panel1";
            // 
            // Form1
            // 
            resources.ApplyResources(this, "$this");
            this.AutoScaleMode = System.Windows.Forms.AutoScaleMode.Font;
            this.Controls.Add(this.panel1);
            this.Controls.Add(this.richTextBox1);
            this.Controls.Add(this.label1);
            this.Name = "Form1";
            this.ResumeLayout(false);
            this.PerformLayout();

        }

        #endregion

        private System.Windows.Forms.Label label1;
        private System.Windows.Forms.RichTextBox richTextBox1;
        private System.Windows.Forms.Panel panel1;

    }
}

Form1.resx

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<root>
  <!-- 
    Microsoft ResX Schema 

    Version 2.0

    The primary goals of this format is to allow a simple XML format 
    that is mostly human readable. The generation and parsing of the 
    various data types are done through the TypeConverter classes 
    associated with the data types.

    Example:

    ... ado.net/XML headers & schema ...
    <resheader name="resmimetype">text/microsoft-resx</resheader>
    <resheader name="version">2.0</resheader>
    <resheader name="reader">System.Resources.ResXResourceReader, System.Windows.Forms, ...</resheader>
    <resheader name="writer">System.Resources.ResXResourceWriter, System.Windows.Forms, ...</resheader>
    <data name="Name1"><value>this is my long string</value><comment>this is a comment</comment></data>
    <data name="Color1" type="System.Drawing.Color, System.Drawing">Blue</data>
    <data name="Bitmap1" mimetype="application/x-microsoft.net.object.binary.base64">
        <value>[base64 mime encoded serialized .NET Framework object]</value>
    </data>
    <data name="Icon1" type="System.Drawing.Icon, System.Drawing" mimetype="application/x-microsoft.net.object.bytearray.base64">
        <value>[base64 mime encoded string representing a byte array form of the .NET Framework object]</value>
        <comment>This is a comment</comment>
    </data>

    There are any number of "resheader" rows that contain simple 
    name/value pairs.

    Each data row contains a name, and value. The row also contains a 
    type or mimetype. Type corresponds to a .NET class that support 
    text/value conversion through the TypeConverter architecture. 
    Classes that don't support this are serialized and stored with the 
    mimetype set.

    The mimetype is used for serialized objects, and tells the 
    ResXResourceReader how to depersist the object. This is currently not 
    extensible. For a given mimetype the value must be set accordingly:

    Note - application/x-microsoft.net.object.binary.base64 is the format 
    that the ResXResourceWriter will generate, however the reader can 
    read any of the formats listed below.

    mimetype: application/x-microsoft.net.object.binary.base64
    value   : The object must be serialized with 
            : System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter
            : and then encoded with base64 encoding.

    mimetype: application/x-microsoft.net.object.soap.base64
    value   : The object must be serialized with 
            : System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Soap.SoapFormatter
            : and then encoded with base64 encoding.

    mimetype: application/x-microsoft.net.object.bytearray.base64
    value   : The object must be serialized into a byte array 
            : using a System.ComponentModel.TypeConverter
            : and then encoded with base64 encoding.
    -->
  <xsd:schema id="root" xmlns="" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:msdata="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:xml-msdata">
    <xsd:import namespace="http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace" />
    <xsd:element name="root" msdata:IsDataSet="true">
      <xsd:complexType>
        <xsd:choice maxOccurs="unbounded">
          <xsd:element name="metadata">
            <xsd:complexType>
              <xsd:sequence>
                <xsd:element name="value" type="xsd:string" minOccurs="0" />
              </xsd:sequence>
              <xsd:attribute name="name" use="required" type="xsd:string" />
              <xsd:attribute name="type" type="xsd:string" />
              <xsd:attribute name="mimetype" type="xsd:string" />
              <xsd:attribute ref="xml:space" />
            </xsd:complexType>
          </xsd:element>
          <xsd:element name="assembly">
            <xsd:complexType>
              <xsd:attribute name="alias" type="xsd:string" />
              <xsd:attribute name="name" type="xsd:string" />
            </xsd:complexType>
          </xsd:element>
          <xsd:element name="data">
            <xsd:complexType>
              <xsd:sequence>
                <xsd:element name="value" type="xsd:string" minOccurs="0" msdata:Ordinal="1" />
                <xsd:element name="comment" type="xsd:string" minOccurs="0" msdata:Ordinal="2" />
              </xsd:sequence>
              <xsd:attribute name="name" type="xsd:string" use="required" msdata:Ordinal="1" />
              <xsd:attribute name="type" type="xsd:string" msdata:Ordinal="3" />
              <xsd:attribute name="mimetype" type="xsd:string" msdata:Ordinal="4" />
              <xsd:attribute ref="xml:space" />
            </xsd:complexType>
          </xsd:element>
          <xsd:element name="resheader">
            <xsd:complexType>
              <xsd:sequence>
                <xsd:element name="value" type="xsd:string" minOccurs="0" msdata:Ordinal="1" />
              </xsd:sequence>
              <xsd:attribute name="name" type="xsd:string" use="required" />
            </xsd:complexType>
          </xsd:element>
        </xsd:choice>
      </xsd:complexType>
    </xsd:element>
  </xsd:schema>
  <resheader name="resmimetype">
    <value>text/microsoft-resx</value>
  </resheader>
  <resheader name="version">
    <value>2.0</value>
  </resheader>
  <resheader name="reader">
    <value>System.Resources.ResXResourceReader, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
  </resheader>
  <resheader name="writer">
    <value>System.Resources.ResXResourceWriter, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
  </resheader>
  <assembly alias="mscorlib" name="mscorlib, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089" />
  <data name="label1.AutoSize" type="System.Boolean, mscorlib">
    <value>True</value>
  </data>
  <assembly alias="System.Windows.Forms" name="System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089" />
  <data name="label1.ImeMode" type="System.Windows.Forms.ImeMode, System.Windows.Forms">
    <value>NoControl</value>
  </data>
  <assembly alias="System.Drawing" name="System.Drawing, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a" />
  <data name="label1.Location" type="System.Drawing.Point, System.Drawing">
    <value>96, 125</value>
  </data>
  <data name="label1.Size" type="System.Drawing.Size, System.Drawing">
    <value>38, 15</value>
  </data>
  <data name="label1.TabIndex" type="System.Int32, mscorlib">
    <value>8</value>
  </data>
  <data name="label1.Text" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>label1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;label1.Name" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>label1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;label1.Type" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>System.Windows.Forms.Label, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;label1.Parent" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>$this</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;label1.ZOrder" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>2</value>
  </data>
  <data name="richTextBox1.Location" type="System.Drawing.Point, System.Drawing">
    <value>15, 12</value>
  </data>
  <data name="richTextBox1.Size" type="System.Drawing.Size, System.Drawing">
    <value>200, 110</value>
  </data>
  <data name="richTextBox1.TabIndex" type="System.Int32, mscorlib">
    <value>0</value>
  </data>
  <data name="richTextBox1.Text" xml:space="preserve">
    <value />
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;richTextBox1.Name" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>richTextBox1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;richTextBox1.Type" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>System.Windows.Forms.RichTextBox, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;richTextBox1.Parent" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>$this</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;richTextBox1.ZOrder" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="panel1.Location" type="System.Drawing.Point, System.Drawing">
    <value>15, 121</value>
  </data>
  <data name="panel1.Size" type="System.Drawing.Size, System.Drawing">
    <value>200, 1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="panel1.TabIndex" type="System.Int32, mscorlib">
    <value>4</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;panel1.Name" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>panel1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;panel1.Type" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>System.Windows.Forms.Panel, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;panel1.Parent" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>$this</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;panel1.ZOrder" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>0</value>
  </data>
  <metadata name="$this.Localizable" type="System.Boolean, mscorlib, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089">
    <value>True</value>
  </metadata>
  <data name="$this.AutoScaleDimensions" type="System.Drawing.SizeF, System.Drawing">
    <value>7, 15</value>
  </data>
  <data name="$this.ClientSize" type="System.Drawing.Size, System.Drawing">
    <value>232, 148</value>
  </data>
  <data name="$this.Font" type="System.Drawing.Font, System.Drawing">
    <value>Segoe UI, 9pt</value>
  </data>
  <data name="$this.Text" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>Form1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;$this.Name" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>Form1</value>
  </data>
  <data name="&gt;&gt;$this.Type" xml:space="preserve">
    <value>System.Windows.Forms.Form, System.Windows.Forms, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089</value>
  </data>
</root>

Program.cs

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
using System.Windows.Forms;

namespace DPITest
{
    static class Program
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// The main entry point for the application.
        /// </summary>
        [STAThread]
        static void Main()
        {
            Application.EnableVisualStyles();
            Application.SetCompatibleTextRenderingDefault(false);
            Application.Run(new Form1());
        }
    }
}

Answer 1

I have had many battles with the zoom issue. I will share my ways of dealing with it.

First, there is the "cheating" way: on all UserControls and Windows, set the property "AutoScaleMode" to "None". I call that cheating because I believe it basically ignores the zoom and keeps it at 100%, which the end user may not appreciate.

Second, the best way I found to deal with it is use "TableLayoutPanel". I found that once I got good with TableLayoutPanel I was making controls faster, cleaner, resizable, and zoomable.

The trick is to NEVER set a fixed width. A fixed width will fix the cell size, and when the control is zoomed, it will go out of that cell size. For controls such as a label (that will always be a set size once it is on the screen), set the row/column to autozie. For controls such as a rich textbox, set it to a %. If you need blank space around sides, make an empty row/column and give it a % value.

Finally, because all these are % values, things will look bad when they get too small. To allow users to be able to use your application no matter what size they make their window, in the designer shrink it down to whatever you want the min size of the control to be, then set "AutoScrollMinSize" to that size. This will bring up scroll bars when the control gets smaller than what you set.

I hope this helps in your efforts to handle zoom!