.net - c# Show Windows Form

Question

So, I'm struggling a little bit here. I am writing a windows console application in C# and have just made a login form for the application called frmLogin. I tried using the MS documented method of;

Form f = new Form();
f.ShowDialog();

but this obviously loads/displays a blank form and not the form I defined in the form designer.

In my main application, I want to be able to show the login form programmatically, but when I try to use;

frmLogin.ShowDialog();

it tells me that "An object reference is required for the non-static field, method or property 'System.Windows.Forms.Form.ShowDialog()'

In the old days, I could show a form by simply using the above snippet of code. So, obviously something has changed since the last time I wrote a windows console app.

Can someone show me the error of my ways?

Answer 1

This creates a new instance of type Form:

Form f = new Form();

Which, of course, is a blank form. It would appear that your type is called frmLogin. Normally this sounds like a variable name and not a class name, but the error you're getting here tells me that it's a class:

frmLogin.ShowDialog();

Given that, then the quickest way to solve your problem would be to create an instance of your form and show it:

frmLogin login = new frmLogin();
login.ShowDialog();

However, in keeping with naming standards and conventions (to help prevent future confusion and problems), I highly recommend renaming the form itself to something like:

LoginForm

Then you can use something like frmLogin as the variable name, which is a much more common approach:

LoginForm frmLogin = new LoginForm();
frmLogin.ShowDialog();