The only way I could find to get the module type would be to use the Get Tag method of the project item and use the tag crio.Type. You can get a lot of other information that way, just look at the project XML to see what tag you want to use.
The following is purely speculation on my part but I would not expect there to be a simple way to interact with the modules through scripting because the cRIO project items are populated by a project provider from the RIO driver so it doesn't get any more specific than project item in the VI server
I find the biggest improvement with Flat design is in the simplest of front panels. Here's a dialog box:
Here I just used link-style buttons (the square around "Save as.." is placed by LabVIEW as it is bound to the Enter key). I eliminated the window tittle normally on the window frame, and instead placed that text in bold. This makes a very clear, uncluttered dialog box.