Enabling Buttons on a Parent form from a child form

I'm not sure how to do this in C#, but I have several buttons on my Parent Form that I want to enable when the user has successfully logged in. How can I enable buttons on the parent form from the child form (ie. I know in VB it's formName.item.property, but since VB is quite different than C# that line of thinking doesn't work for me.

One other question I have that pertains to that is how can I make a child form have an application.modal property?

your help is appreciated.

Thanks.

does anyone know how to do this at all, or point me in the right direction? :(

Probably, you don't need to access the parent form from your child form. U can use a successful login to come back to your parent and enabling then the btn by value i.e.

child.doModal();
parent.btn.enable=child.btnOK;

for modal() property, try
using System.Windows.Forms; //for new forms
or derive the child from your parent
child : parent

If that doesn't meet your requirements please give more details.

ok, I am having a lot of problems setting up any of the child forms as modal.
Also, I would like to be able to re-enable certain properties on my parent form from the child form.

For instance, the user must log-in successfully before they are allowed to pull up a form that allows them to manipulate a file.

Once the form to manipulate the files is menu item that calls the form is disabled so there are no more than once instance of said form.

I want to be able to re-enable that menu item when the user closes the file manipulation form.

Those are the two things I am having problems with. I appreciate the help.

Thanks.

Like this: Form1 calls Form2.

Form2 frm = new Form2();

frm.ShowDialog();


---------------------

From Form2 you do:

Form1 prt = (Form1)this.Parent;

prt.btn1.Enabled = true;


------------

This should be about it.

Quote:

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Originally posted by WillemM
From Form2 you do:

Form1 prt = (Form1)this.Parent;

prt.btn1.Enabled = true;

This should be about it.

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Hmmm... isn't here a tiny threading issue? I mean, well, as far as I know, any changes on a form must be done in the same thread that generated the form. Do enabling/disabling a control fall into this category of changes, that require Invoke?

Ok, I was able to figure out how to do it, and will post it here for the rest of you. Finally I can take some asprine and stop beating my head against a wall. :)

on Form1:
void functionOnForm1()
{
itemname.property = XXXXX;
}

on Form2:
((Form1)this.ParentForm).functionOnForm1();

I went with this route and had a function on Form1 change the properties on that form.

Thanks all that helped.

Hi there,
I just try to do the same way you show. I got a problem :
((Form1)this.ParentForm).functionOnForm1() is null. Could you give me a clue?

Tnx,

yeap, the parent form is not set so it will be null only. if you are working in MDI application then the parent form will make more sense.

-Paresh

Hey pareshgh,
thx for replay. what if I don't want to use MDI form? Is there the way to do this? Or the only way is to use MDI approach?

Regards,:cool:

in non-MDI case you will pass reference of the current form in the second form
and thus you access that in second form.


Paresh