It is my opinion that this is an intentional move by Microsoft to make all existing software non-functional. (There is no way that this is simply some accident. If it was, it would have been fixed in service pack 2.)

I have written several totally trivial programs to demonstrate the problem. They are located in the zip file. Basically, the forms contain 3 buttons

• One in the upper left hand corner
• One near the lower right hand corner .. but not touching the border
• One near the lower right hand corner that is pinned (anchored) to that corner

One button saves a jpeg of the form image .. just to simplify creating this help page.

TForm.Scaled must be false

This keeps scroll bars from being displayed in Vista. This has no effect in Windows XP.

TForm.Autoscroll must be false

If this is not done, then objects anchored to the right and bottom edges of the form will be rendered in the wrong place in Windows XP when Form.Scaled is false.

TForm.Font.Name must be something other than MS Sans Serif

In Vista, when the font is MS Sans Serif, it is automatically replaced with a larger font and some text will no longer fit inside the buttons.

procedure TForm1.FormCreate(Sender: TObject); begin form1.AutoScroll := true; end;

XP	Vista	Comment
		Default form .. before Button 3 was anchored Default.exe TForm.Scaled = true TForm.Autoscroll = true XP - All 3 buttons are visible Vista - Different font size, button size, and scrollbars
		Button 3 is anchored to the lower right hand corner Button3_Anchored.exe TForm.Scaled = true TForm.Autoscroll = true XP - All 3 buttons are visible Vista - The vertical scrollbar is gone, enlarging the form will not make Button 3 visible
		Scaled_Off.exe TForm.Scaled = false TForm.Autoscroll = true XP - Button 3 is in the wrong place - VCL error. Vista - Buttons are smaller and the scrollbars are gone. Still has a larger font size.
		Scaled_Autoscroll_Off.exe TForm.Scaled = false TForm.Autoscroll = false XP - All 3 buttons look good Vista - All the buttons are the correct size and in the correct place. Text in button 2 is too large.
		Form with all the changes New_Font.exe TForm.Scaled = false TForm.Autoscroll = false form1.Font.Name = 'microsoft sans serif'; Both systems are showing similar content Success :)
		Autoscroll_Off.exe TForm.Scaled = true TForm.Autoscroll = false XP - All 3 buttons look good Vista - All the buttons are displayed and expanded to display the text.

What kind of an idiot spends time designing something and then wants someone else to change how it looks. It is like having some museum changing the color of the flowers in a painting .. or changing a seascape to a mountain valley. Sorry .. I consider that to be vandalism and a despicable copyright violation.

In fact, this is probably a design error in Vista. The compatibility options should have worked. (Of course, I tried all the Vista compatibility settings .. and many different combinations. I never saw any difference. None at all.) However, the fact that this problem has been there for a number of years indicates that it might be intentional.

On the other hand, it is pretty apparent that the Delphi 5 VCL contains a design error .. the scaling should have worked.

Another source of trouble is TForm.Constraints - a set of 4 properties that can be used to control the minimum and maximum width and height of your forms. (Vista - the OS that keeps on giving.) (Thanks to a reader - include an email address if you want a response.)

Make the text on your screen larger or smaller

How to use the Windows 7 dpi setting to change the application size. (I simply assume that Vista is similar since I see similar dialog boxes.)

Near the bottom, this explains how to enable the Windows XP style DPI scaling. On my system, the check box was checked .. but also greyed out.

MS Sans Serif font is bigger

"In windows 7, the [MS Sans Serif] font is bigger, and it results missing characters in cells and missing rows on the program tables." August 8, 2010

The only response describes a registry hack - however, it is not acceptable for me to tell people to hack the registry to run my code. This is also where I got the previous link.

Microsoft Sans Serif

This indicates that MS Sans Serif is a bit mapped font and that Microsoft Sans Serif is "metrically compatible" (whatever that may mean)

Put MS Sans Serif back in to your menus

"While you may select any other font in the display properties for pull down menus, if you select MS Sans Serif MS Office and other recent MS applications will automatically replace your selection with Tahoma."

This helped me discover that Microsoft treats MS Sans Serif differently from all other fonts. Specifically, in buttons, the application always displayed the same font size regardless of what I did. When I selected Arial, my font size changes had an effect. This reference indicated that the font name was causing the problem.

From the provided examples, the difference between Tahoma and MS Sans Serif is the size of the dots in the ellipses. In fact, that is the only obvious difference. (There are numerous other differences, but at 8 points they are not so obvious.)

Fonts for the Web

This provides examples and descriptions of many common fonts. However, it incorrectly indicates that Tahoma is a monospaced font.

How to deal with form size issues from Delphi 6 and WinXP to Delphi 2007 and Vista/Win7

This had the real answer

change all form's to AutoScroll = False

URL: http:// mc-computing.com / Languages / Delphi / VistaForms / Delphi_5_Forms.html