Bonnie,

Thank you for the explanation. Now I see that for me the most appropriate would be to use a UserControl. Let me explain. In my VFP app I almost never drop data entry controls (textbox, label, etc) on forms. Instead data entry controls are placed on containers. Then, in the INIT of the form, the container is dynamically "placed" (don't know the right word) on the form. This allows me to make customer changes for some customers as I can at run time (based on a certain setting) replaced a standard container with this customer specific (custom) container.

I don't know if the above type approach is doable in WinForms. That is, can I dynamically instantiate/assign a UserControl to a form?

>Dmitry,
>
>As Cetin says, you can use a Panel. As Kevin says, you can use a UserControl. In addition to those, it sounded to me like you also might be interested in using a GroupBox. All three of these controls have similarities, in that they're "containers", and you can visually drop stuff on them, but they are typically used for different purposes.
>
>UserControls are typically used as a "standalone" set of controls (IOW, you'd design a UserControl visually by dropping on TextBoxes, etc. and save it as a single class file, MyCustomerControl.cs for example).
>
>Panels are typically used for docking, along with Splitters, and are dropped on a Form or UserControl.
>
>GroupBoxes are typically used, as the name suggests, to visually group a set of controls together(TextBoxes,etc), and are dropped on a Form or UserControl.
>
>~~Bonnie