Problems playing a CD

[wldrumstcs]

Hello. I have created a CD player using mciSendStrings, but I am having trouble getting the current track. For some reason, the code below is always returning the current track as "1":

Public getCurrentTrack As Integer = Nothing
 
Sub CDplay()
        Try
            Dim totalTime As String = Space(128)
            mciSendString("close " & TheFile, CStr(0), 0, 0)
            TheFile = Chr(34) & Trim(MP3File) & Chr(34)
            mciSendString("open " & TheFile, CStr(0), 0, 0)
            mciSendString("Set " & TheFile & " time format TMSF", 0, 0, 0)
            mciSendString("Status " & TheFile & " current track", totalTime, 128, 0)
            getCurrentTrack = Val(totalTime)
            If getNumberTracks() = track Then
                mciSendString("Play " & TheFile & " from " & getCurrentTrack, 0, 0, 0)
            Else
                mciSendString("Play " & TheFile & " from " & getCurrentTrack & " to " & getCurrentTrack + 1, 0, 0, 0)
            End If
        Catch exc As Exception
            MessageBox.Show(exc.Message, "Error!", MessageBoxButtons.OK)
        End Try
    End Sub

[jmcilhinney]

I don't quite understand why you have a string called "totalTime" that is giving you the track number. Is it the time or the track number? If it's the time then I'd guess that that's you issue, but if it's the track number then you've used a confusing naming convention. Also, from a coding style perspective, a variable should not be called "getCurrentTrack". That would be an appropriate name for a method that actually gets the number, but just "currentTrack" or "currentTrackNumber" would be more appropriate for a variable. variable and property names should be nouns becasue they ARE something, while method names should generally be or include verbs as they DO something. Finally, I'd suggest avoiding the use of so many Runtime functions. There's obviously been a wealth of debate on their merits and I don't see them as evil like some, but I do believe that they should be second choice to System-based alternatives. I also believe that the Val function works in a counter-intuitive fashion, and it might be the problem if you have non numerical characters in that "totalTime" variable.

[penagate]

Why are you passing a filename if you are creating a CD player?

The command you want is, I think, "status cd position". Instead of calling Val() on it you should use .Substring(totalTime, 1, 2) although, as jmcilhinney points out, you really should give it a better name