Buttons/controls outside a dockable panel

[mikkelnymand4EMUM]

I'm trying to create a dockable panel that can be "minimized", and I want to place a column of buttons outside the panel. 

I'm not able to see anything outside the panel at the moment, and I can't even make a transparent background. 

Does a workaround exist, or better yet, a supported way of placing some controls outside the dockable panel like shown below: 

I can create the page in visual studio, but everything outside the page is not shown in Revit.

[RPTHOMAS108 · Accepted solution]

This doesn't sound possible via the IDockablePaneProvider i.e. you are provided a rectangular area to put a FrameworkElement in (Page advised) and can't place anything outside of that.

In WPF you can collapse things but I believe the pane is restricted by title bar and probably sizes itself based on how it is docked with other panes or what it's starting content is. Anything set to transparent will appear black e.g. empty space allowance on screen not used. In fact pages in WPF are set to transparent by default and other panel like controls inherit that. So you often have to set the background of the page or you'll end up with many black holes in your dockable pane i.e. the difference between the rectangle you've been provided and the visible elements you've filed it with.

Obviously before we had IDockablePaneProvider we had modeless Windows and Forms (which can still be used and can still be shaped like a pineapple if so desired).

[mikkelnymand4EMUM]

I feared as much - it's a bummer because it would make so much sense UI wise, to be able to minimize some docks and be able to open them "on-the-fly" instead of having to navigate to my Ribbon and open the dock. 

Thanks for the reply though. I will likely just continue with the IDockablePaneProvider, and then find an alternative UI that I find sufficient. 

Have a nice day.