Standard Windows Controls

Standard Windows controls should be used whenever possible, because they are the most compatible with accessibility aids.

Each standard Windows control is a separate window of a specific class, so the accessibility aid can get notified when the focus moves to a new control. The aid can determine the control's window class, and that tells the aid what additional messages it can send to the control to query or alter the state. The aid can also identify all of the child controls contained within a parent window and identify the parent of any control.

The Windows 95 common controls library provides standardized implementations of many controls that are not supported by Windows itself, and these are all designed to be compatible with accessibility aids. Many, such as the list view and tree view controls, are extremely flexible and can be used to replace a variety of custom and owner-drawn controls.