Am i missing something here with cookies

OK back in the normal asp days setting and reading a cookie was so dam simple

response.cookies("blah") = blah &
request.cookies("blah")

ok now the .net way (*** is that all about)

ok heres my real question

i have a control which handles the left hand side of my website on here ive got a littie area which displays users shopping cart so therefore i store the users cart id in the cookie,

when ever i load the index page is get this error

VB Code:

If Request.Cookies("CartCookie").Value >= 0 Then

Quote:

---

Object reference not set to an instance of an object.

---

its because i havnt defined the NEW part of the cookie...
So if i do instead

VB Code:

Dim cookie As HttpCookie = New HttpCookie("CartCookie")
if cookie.value > 0 then

It allows me to run the page without errors, however every time i add to the cart its panel in this control is never displayed....

Now am i just being thick or what

Perhaps the real question is whether that code is executing before the page has finished loading its controls and state.

What event does that code run in your user control?

onLoad

Normally I would say try the PreRender event, but that shouldn't make a difference for the Request object.

You stated assigning a new instance worked, but weren't too clear about 'its panel' not displaying...?