I meant something like this:
Code:
+-------- tab control border ---------------+
|                                           | 
|          +-----dialog border------+       |
|          |                        |       |
|          |         [control]      |       |
|          |                        |       |
|          +------------------------+       |
|                                           | 
+-------------------------------------------+

so you place the tab outline outside the dialog, and the controls on the tab, but inside the dialog outline.
now you can hide a whole bunch of controls at a time using did -f from your menu, but the tab control isn't visible, only the controls on it are, so it looks as if you did -v/did -h all controls on 1 tab.