How can you load multiple instances of a form, and interact with each seperately?

I want to make a chat application, with rooms and people can message each other. When they do message each other - how can i load up identical forms and be able to interact with them and set variables or send data to each form?

VB Code:

Dim Frm as Form1   
    Set Frm = New Form1
    Load Frm
    'Assing values to Properties or Public variables in Frm before show
    'you can send this Form (Parent) as a Property Set
    Frm.Show

That should be enough, but, if for some reason you want your main Form to get info from these subForms, you can add them to a Public Collection or assign a value to TAG property of each Form and interate trought Forms to get the one you need. Anyway, i don't think you'll need to access each Form from the main Form, since they can report any info to there parent (if you pass the parent as Property Set).

whats a property set o_O

VaxoP:

Quote:

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chat application

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Quote:

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people can message each other

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I'm not sure if you want to build a Chat Application or an Instant Messaging Application?
Either way, there is a little bit more involved than just adding some identical forms.

This is a very common question that has been asked and answered many time before.

I would suggest you start by searching the forum.

Here are a couple of previous posts that might be helpful for you.

http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.p...highlight=Chat

http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.p...highlight=Chat

Good Luck with your applicaation.

Property Let: Assign to variable
Property Get: Get variable/Object
Property Set: Assign to object

Wih them you pass or get data to/from Forms, it's better than just using Public variables/Objects inside them. So inside each Chat Form you can have:

VB Code:

Private FrmParent As Form
 
Public Property Set ParentForm(pForm As Form)
    Set FrmParent = pForm
End Property

And show each Form with:

VB Code:

Dim Frm as Form1   
    Set Frm = New Form1
    Load Frm
    'Assing values to Properties or Public variables in Frm before show
    'you can send this Form (Parent) as a Property Set
    Set Frm.ParentForm = Me 'Now Frm knows who is its Parent
    Frm.Show

Now Frm can use its Parent to Get or Send info

VB Code:

Me.BackColor = FormParent.BackColor 'Get something
FormParent.Caption = "Hey Im " & Me.Name & " Sending This" 'Send Something

You can store the user's name or ID or whatever is used to identify them in the Tag property of the forms. Then you can iterate through the Forms collection looking for the proper Tag value.