VB.net User Control button press raise event to parent form

Hi Experts,

I am a complete novice in vb.net.  I have a form with a panel within which sits several user controls.  Depending on what activity the user is performing, a different user control is displayed in the panel.  No problems.

However, I would like one of the user controls to have 6 buttons, that when pressed, the master form can understand which button has been pressed.

I tried to add an Event to the User Control but it says the handles clause requires a WithEvents variable defined in the containing type or one of its base types.  But I couldn't get that working so I've come to you for some help.

UserControl:
Public Class UserControl1

    Public Event S1_Button_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs)

    Public Sub ButtonG2_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles ButtonG2.Click
        RaiseEvent S1_Button_Click(sender, e)
    End Sub

End Class

Form:
Public Class Form1

    Dim Screen1 As UserControl1
    Dim Active_screen As System.Windows.Forms.Control

    Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load

        Screen1 = New UserControl1
        Panel1.Controls.Add(Screen1)
        Active_screen = Screen1

    End Sub

    Private Sub Screen1_Button_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Screen1.S1_Button_Click
            MsgBox("Button pressed!") <----- Here I want to understand which button was pressed but I've put this to just get it going
    End Sub

End Class
mondintatorAsked:
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bansidharCommented:
you should use
Dim WithEvents Screen1 As UserControl1 ' You need WithEvents keyword for more help on this WithEvents (Visual Basic)


If you just want to get the name of the button, I would suggest another approach. Use simpler event in user control.
UserControl:
Public Class UserControl1

        Public Event Button_Click(ByVal buttonName As String)

        Public Sub ButtonG2_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles ButtonG2.Click
            RaiseEvent Button_Click("ButtonG2")
        End Sub
        Public Sub ButtonG1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles ButtonG1.Click
            RaiseEvent Button_Click("ButtonG1")
        End Sub
        Public Sub AnotherButton_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles AnotherButton.Click
            RaiseEvent Button_Click("AnotherButton")
        End Sub
End Class

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Form:
Public Class Form1

    Dim WithEvents Screen1 As UserControl1
    Dim Active_screen As System.Windows.Forms.Control

    Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load

        Screen1 = New UserControl1
        Panel1.Controls.Add(Screen1)
        Active_screen = Screen1

    End Sub

    Private Sub Screen1_Button_Click(ByVal buttonName As String) Handles Screen1.S1_Button_Click
            MsgBox(buttonName & " pressed!") <----- Here I want to understand which button was pressed but I've put this to just get it going
    End Sub

End Class

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You can reduce code for the control in above example like the following.

Public Class UserControl1

        Public Event Button_Click(ByVal buttonName As String)

	'Handling multiple buttons
        Public Sub ButtonG2_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles ButtonG2.Click, ButtonG1.Click, AnotherButton.Click
            RaiseEvent Button_Click(DirectCast(sender, Button).Name)
        End Sub
 
End Class

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mondintatorAuthor Commented:
Thank you!  That gets the temporary message to work, but what is the correct syntax for passing which button has been pressed.  UserControl1 has 6 buttons - how does form1 know which button has been pressed?
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bansidharCommented:
In
RaiseEvent Button_Click("ButtonG2") '"ButtonG2" is passed to the event handler as parameter.

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if you want to pass the button number as integer from 1 to 6 you can modify the event handler as
Public Event Button_Click(ByVal buttonID As Integer) ' the name buttonID  doesn't matter you can use any name here

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and on each button press of the control you can raise event like
       'Assuming ButtonG1 is your first button and ButtonG2 is your second button
       Public Sub ButtonG1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles ButtonG1.Click
            RaiseEvent Button_Click(1)
        End Sub

       Public Sub ButtonG2_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles ButtonG2.Click
            RaiseEvent Button_Click(2)
        End Sub

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and in form
Private Sub Screen1_Button_Click(ByVal buttonID As String) Handles Screen1.S1_Button_Click
    Select Case buttonID
        Case 1
            ' button 1 was clicked
        Case 2
            ' button 2 was clicked etc.....
   End Select
End Sub

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Hope this clarifies.
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Jacques Bourgeois (James Burger)PresidentCommented:
I would not call the Event Button_Click, but rather ButtonClick. This would follow the conventions and prevents possible ??? when coming back in the code later and see something like Screen1_Button_Click. By convention, the name of an event method has only one underscore.

Right click on the event name and select rename, this will rename it everywhere it is used in the project.
1
bansidharCommented:
I agree, I actually don't like the underscores in the function names. I use the full camel casing convention (too much addicted to resharper). I made only minimal changes to the original code, not to confuse the Author.
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