Forms collection - Can be used as a tutorial - SOLVED

[csf]

Hi,

I am creating an application which has an MDIForm as the startup form. From here, the user clicks on a 'Get Content' button, which calls the GetContent() procedure, and x amount of forms are created depending on how many documents are open in Word.

For this example, we will say 3 documents are open in Word, therefore when the user clicks on the 'Get Content' button, 3 forms are created:

'***********
'Create forms:
'***********
Public Sub GetContent()
Dim f1 as Form1
Dim myFormCollection As New Form1Collection()

'Remove all current forms:
If myFormCollection.Count > 0 Then
myFormCollection.Clear
End If

For i = 1 To intDocCount 'Number of Word docs. open
f1 = New Form1() 'Create new Form
f1.MdiParent = Me
f1.Text = objWord.Documents.Item(i).FullName
myFormCollection.Add(f1) 'Add the Form to the Collection class.
Next
End Sub

To keep track of the forms, I am using the Form1Collection class which I created. Every time a Form is created it is added to the class: myFormCollection.Add(f1)

'*********************
'Class: Form1Collection
'*********************
Public Class Form1Collection
Inherits System.Collections.CollectionBase

Public Function Add(ByVal myForm1 As Form1)
List.Add(myForm1)
End Function

End Class

The problem I am having is with the section of GetContent() that removes all current forms. This is designed to protect the user if they click on the 'Get Content' button more than once. Instead of lots of forms building up on top of each other, this clears all current forms. However, even though I am using the .Clear method, the forms build up on top of each other. Ie. If 3 Word documents are open and the user keeps clicking 'Get Content', the forms increment in 3, 6 then 9 etc.

I know this is a bit long, but as a complete newbie (like most of us to this, any help really would be much appreciated

Any ideas?

Thanks

Chris

[Bananafish]

If myFormCollection.Count > 0 Then 
   myFormCollection.Clear 
End If

The first thing is that the code above merely removes your collection of form objects - it doesn't actually close down the forms held within.

To do this you would need to do something like:-

Dim oForm as Form
For each oForm in myFormCollection
     oForm.Dispose
Next
myFormCollection.Clear

However, in saying this you do not need to hold a collection of all your active forms as the mdi parents holds this already.

For example,

'************************************************
      '* Close down all open mdi children             *
      '************************************************
      Dim oForm As Form
      Dim booOver As Boolean = False
      Do Until booOver
         oForm = Me.ActiveMdiChild
         If oForm Is Nothing Then
            booOver = True
         Else
            oForm.Dispose()
         End If
      Loop

Hope this helps

[csf]

Great, thanks! That worked perfectly.