Underneath the TitleBar you get an area or menus and toolbars. Though the precise contents of these items vary between applications, most applications have menus and toolbars.

In the image you can see that there is a list of menu titles (on a plain background). One of these titles is highlighted, a menu is displayed and one of these items is highlighted.Underneath the menu is an example of a toolbar. Applications will typically have only one menu, but may have several toolbars, aligned either horizontally or vertically.

StatusBars and Resize Grips

The other item which you will typically see at the bottom edge of the frame is the status bar. This is an information area which is typically present in applications. If the window is not maximized you will also see a resize grip in the bottom right hand corner which enables you to change the size of your application window.

The Start Menu and TaskBar

One persistent element on your screen is usually the combination of the Start Menu and the TaskBar. The ways these appear vary depending on your operating system.The taskbar appearance may vary with versions of Windows, but the structure is fairly standard:

      A Start button at the end, when clicked will display the Start Menu. The Start Menu structure has been standard for years, but Windows XP allows a new style of Start Menu. This document discusses the skinning of both.

      A series of toolbar areas which are separated by Rebars which allow you to move them around. The most important of these toolbars is …

      The TaskBar; a list of running applications displayed on TaskBar buttons

      A System tray area which displays background tasks and a clock. On Windows XP this area also has an arrow which allows you to expand and contract the System Tray

Buttons

Apart from toolbars, there are three type of button controls used within windows; the command button, checkboxes and radio buttons.

	Command buttons are the buttons used to execute actions.
	Checkboxes allow you to select options. This image shows a GroupBox within which there are several options to choose from, from which you can choose as many as you want.
	adio buttons function like checkboxes, but you can only choose one within the group. Selecting one radio button automatically deselects the others within the group.

Lists

There are two different types of list within Windows; the regular list box and the drop-down or Combo list box.

	The regular list box displays a list of options with scrollbars if necessary to allow access to the full list. There may also be a headerbar which provides titles for the data.
	A drop-down or combo list box save space by only displaying the options when the arrow at the end of the box is clicked. The two types differ in that a drop-down allows you to only select from the list, and combo allows you to select from the list or type your own value in the box. Functionally they are different, but visually they are the same.