vb.net: CAN, timers, while loops, and Application.DoEvents()

[taylorcu]

I'm new to vb.net and i'm building code in vb.net that inputs and outputs CAN-messages in visual studio 2003 with an IFAK CAN driver. I want to make a loop that checks the results of a global variable incremented/changed by the timer. I enable a timer with the following code

        timerCounter = 0
        timer.Interval = 30
        timer.Enabled = True
 

the windows autocode only generates:

Me.timer = New System.Windows.Forms.Timer(Me.components)
 

in the timer_tick event i increment timerCounter-integer and read a value into messageRead-arraylist from ReadMessage sub

        messageInfo = ReadMessage(15)
        timerCounter += 1
        messageRead.Add(messageInfo)
 

i loop and check timerCounter with the following command:

System.Windows.Forms.Application.DoEvents()
 

before i put this in code in the program looped infinitely, i think that this line forces the program to go to any available event.

My problem is that if the device is connected by the routine, the program crashes, but if it is connected before the program still runs. The device needs to be connected in the routine

What can i do? Is there another method like Refresh()? Should i look into multi-threading?

[r035198x]

Moved to .NET forum

[pbmods]

Heya, Taylor. Welcome to TSDN!

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