In WPF, can I have a borderless window that has regular minimize, maximise and close buttons?

Question

If you look at the Chrome browser when maximized, it has its tab headers right at the top of the window. Can I do something similar?

Answer 1

Absolutely, but you're going to have to remake those buttons yourself (it's not hard, don't worry).

In your MainWindow.xaml:

<Window ...
        Title="" Height="Auto" Width="Auto" Icon="../Resources/MyIcon.ico" 
        ResizeMode="NoResize" WindowStartupLocation="CenterScreen" 
        WindowStyle="None" AllowsTransparency="True" Background="Transparent"
        ...>
    <Canvas>
       <Button /> <!-- Close -->
       <Button /> <!-- Minimize -->
       <Button /> <!-- Maximize -->
       <TabControl>
           ...
       </TabControl>
    </Canvas>
</Window>

Then you just have to place the Buttons and the TabControl as wished on the Canvas, and customize the look and feel.

EDIT: The built in commands for closing/maximizing/minimizing in .NET 4.5 are SystemCommands.CloseWindowCommand/ SystemCommands.MaximizeWindowCommand/SystemCommands.MinimizeWindowCommand

So if you're using .NET 4.5, you can do:

<Window ...
        Title="" Height="Auto" Width="Auto" Icon="../Resources/MyIcon.ico" 
        ResizeMode="NoResize" WindowStartupLocation="CenterScreen" 
        WindowStyle="None" AllowsTransparency="True" Background="Transparent"
        ...>
    <Window.CommandBindings>
        <CommandBinding Command="{x:Static SystemCommands.CloseWindowCommand}" CanExecute="CommandBinding_CanExecute_1" Executed="CommandBinding_Executed_1" />
        <CommandBinding Command="{x:Static SystemCommands.MaximizeWindowCommand}" CanExecute="CommandBinding_CanExecute_1" Executed="CommandBinding_Executed_2" />
        <CommandBinding Command="{x:Static SystemCommands.MinimizeWindowCommand}" CanExecute="CommandBinding_CanExecute_1" Executed="CommandBinding_Executed_3" />
    </Window.CommandBindings>
    <Canvas>
       <Button Command="{x:Static SystemCommands.CloseWindowCommand}" Content="Close" />
       <Button Command="{x:Static SystemCommands.MaximizeWindowCommand}" Content="Maximize" />
       <Button Command="{x:Static SystemCommands.MinimizeWindowCommand}" Content="Minimize" />
       <TabControl>
           ...
       </TabControl>
    </Canvas>
</Window>

And in your C# code-behind:

    private void CommandBinding_CanExecute_1(object sender, CanExecuteRoutedEventArgs e)
    {
        e.CanExecute = true;
    }

    private void CommandBinding_Executed_1(object sender, ExecutedRoutedEventArgs e)
    {
        SystemCommands.CloseWindow(this);
    }

    private void CommandBinding_Executed_2(object sender, ExecutedRoutedEventArgs e)
    {
        SystemCommands.MaximizeWindow(this);
    }

    private void CommandBinding_Executed_3(object sender, ExecutedRoutedEventArgs e)
    {
        SystemCommands.MinimizeWindow(this);
    }

This will make close/maximize/minimize works exactly like with a regular window.
Of course, you may want to use System.Windows.Interactivity to move the C# into a ViewModel.