I think what you might want is a Mediator, as per MVC. It sounds like you are hitting the wall on your WYSIWYG form builder and need to transfer part or all of what is going on into some automated code.
A good example of this is a keyboard I was emulating on a form, so instead of manually placing the size and location of each key, I make an algorithm do it.
If you look into MVC, particularly pureMVC, you will see that a mediator is responsible for driving and responding to controls -- so there is a bit of wiring up to do. I am not saying you have to use MVC, but just the concept of a mediator. Subclassing each control seems like overkill from the information given.
There can be more than one mediator per form too. When I do MVC I will make a mediator for ALMOST every control, excepting menus, which there will be a mediator for each, and each submenu -- and toolbar (buttons) will all be managed as a group.
Mediators are a good way isolate responsibilities, for instance, you can have one mediator in charge of the background color of treelists, or have a mediator that keeps track of focus issues.
Looking at your post again, I think you should probably look into pureMVC, there is a C# version out on the web. If you are really clever you can get Reflection to wire things up automatically based on the names of your handlers. MVC is a good way to go because it loosens the coupling of your code, so instead of directly calling functions you just send a notification up and whoever 'cares' will receive it. This way you don't have to remember at the event point all the things you need to do, and everyone out there doesn't have to be present.
The downside is, you can no longer follow your code around by jumping from function to function in all cases.
Think of it this way, every class instance is isolated and needs to know very little about the outside world -- only the message conventions. How much faster can you program a class when all it has to worry about is itself :)
Psuedo-code:
///////////////////////////////// // I mediate a form called AppsFm C AppsFmMed = NAME //="AppsFmMed" // ///////////////////////////////// // published message = ___P_LOAD //="AppsFmMed_LOAD" // ///////////////////////////////// // interested in messages; = ___I_DATAPROXYNAME_DATACHANGED //="DataProxyName_DATACHANGED" // ///////////////////////////////// // my controls p it // the form get{return ViewForm as AppsFm;} // p form // the same form p okBU // a button get{return GetControl("okBU") as SimpleButton;} p cancelBU // a button p appsTL // a treelist // ////////////////////////////////// //ctors Cn AppsFmMed() Cn AppsFmMed(string mediator_name_) Cn AppsFmMed(string mediator_name_, object view_component_) Cn AppsFmMed(string mediator_name_, object view_component_, object view_form_) // ////////////////////////////////// // notifications come here and I respond to them Fn HandleNotification(INotification notification_){ switch notification_.Name case:___I_DATAPROXYNAME_DATACHANGED } // ////////////////////////////////// // initialization code, wire up events Fn hookEvents() { assignFormEvent("FormClosed"); assignFormEvent("Load"); assignControlEvent(okBU.Name, "Click", "evtClick"); assignControlEvent(cancelBU.Name, "Click", "evtClick"); } // ////////////////////////////////// // utility fns Fn initLabels() Fn saveValues() Fn loadValues() Fn initForm() // ////////////////////////////////// // I am born and registered to recieve "interests", Fn OnRegister() Fn OnRemove() // ////////////////////////////////// // the control events are wired to these Fn evtClick(object sender_, EventArgs e_) Fn EvtLoad(object sender_, EventArgs e_) Fn EvtFormClosed(object sender_, FormClosedEventArgs e_)
