Deleting a Photo stored in a Picturebox

[TomA]

Hi All,

I have a picturebox on a form containing the photo of a person. As you
advance through the records, the photo updates. Rather than storing the
images in an inefficient blob field in a table, I have the separate images
stored in an image directory with primary key as the filename (3476.jpg). If
the image exists, I display the image. All this works fine.

I have a buttons that allow for the insertion and deletion of photos. The
“add� works fine too. But I am getting errors when I attempt to delete an
image – “file is being used by another process.� The only time the image is
“used� is when I display it on the form. I am assuming the form/picturebox
is locking the image (what else?). I coded the procedure to reset the image
to a default missing image photo. That did not work so I set the picturebox
to nothing first. That did not work either. I also verified the string
being passed to the delete.file method. Here is my code:
Private Sub cmdRemovePhoto_ Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e
As System.EventArg s) Handles cmdRemovePhoto. Click

Dim intReturn As Integer

intReturn = MsgBox("Delete this Photo? This cannot be reversed.",
MsgBoxStyle.Yes No + MsgBoxStyle.Que stion + MsgBoxStyle.Def aultButton2,
"Warning... ")

If intReturn = 6 Then

picPhoto.Image = Nothing

picPhoto.Image = Image.FromFile( pubGlobalSetup &
"\imageFolder\m issingphoto.jpg ")

Try

File.Delete(pub GlobalSetup & "\imageFold er\" &
LTrim(Str(intCo ntactID)) & ".jpg") ' <--Error Here

cmdRemovePhoto. Enabled = False

Catch ee As Exception

MsgBox(ee.Messa ge)

End Try

End If

End Sub

I would sure appreciate any ideas. This should be easy. I have no clue
what could be locking the file. It has to be the picturebox doesn’t it? But
at the time I am deleting, it has been replaced. I checked the file
attribues at the time I delete and it is set only to "Archive". Someone in
Google had a similar problem and the respondant suggested a file.close
method. There is no such method. There is a fileclose(buffe r#) method for
datafiles.

Thanks much!
--
Tom

[tommaso.gastaldi]

Try loading. Making a in memory copy of the image (drawimage). Dispose
original Image used for load.
Let me know...

-tom

TomA ha scritto:

Hi All,

I have a picturebox on a form containing the photo of a person. As you
advance through the records, the photo updates. Rather than storing the
images in an inefficient blob field in a table, I have the separate images
stored in an image directory with primary key as the filename (3476.jpg). If
the image exists, I display the image. All this works fine.

I have a buttons that allow for the insertion and deletion of photos. The
"add" works fine too. But I am getting errors when I attempt to delete an
image - "file is being used by another process." The only time the image is
"used" is when I display it on the form. I am assuming the form/picturebox
is locking the image (what else?). I coded the procedure to reset the image
to a default missing image photo. That did not work so I set the picturebox
to nothing first. That did not work either. I also verified the string
being passed to the delete.file method. Here is my code:
Private Sub cmdRemovePhoto_ Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e
As System.EventArg s) Handles cmdRemovePhoto. Click

Dim intReturn As Integer

intReturn = MsgBox("Delete this Photo? This cannot be reversed.",
MsgBoxStyle.Yes No + MsgBoxStyle.Que stion + MsgBoxStyle.Def aultButton2,
"Warning... ")

If intReturn = 6 Then

picPhoto.Image = Nothing

picPhoto.Image = Image.FromFile( pubGlobalSetup &
"\imageFolder\m issingphoto.jpg ")

Try

File.Delete(pub GlobalSetup & "\imageFold er\" &
LTrim(Str(intCo ntactID)) & ".jpg") ' <--Error Here

cmdRemovePhoto. Enabled = False

Catch ee As Exception

MsgBox(ee.Messa ge)

End Try

End If

End Sub

I would sure appreciate any ideas. This should be easy. I have no clue
what could be locking the file. It has to be the picturebox doesn't it? But
at the time I am deleting, it has been replaced. I checked the file
attribues at the time I delete and it is set only to "Archive". Someone in
Google had a similar problem and the respondant suggested a file.close
method. There is no such method. There is a fileclose(buffe r#) method for
datafiles.

Thanks much!
--
Tom

[Herfried K. Wagner [MVP]]

"TomA" <To**@discussio ns.microsoft.co mschrieb:

I have a buttons that allow for the insertion and deletion of photos. The
“add� works fine too. But I am getting errors when I attempt to delete an
image – “file is being used by another process.� The only time the image
is
“used� is when I display it on the form. I am assuming the
form/picturebox
is locking the image (what else?).

Check out the snippets in the article below -- they demonstrate ways to load
an image without locking the file:

<URL:http://dotnet.mvps.org/dotnet/code/graphics/#ImageNoLock>

--
M S Herfried K. Wagner
M V P <URL:http://dotnet.mvps.org/>
V B <URL:http://classicvb.org/petition/>

[TomA]

Thanks Tom (1),

Your suggestion worked. I had to make several changes in the program. In
the event someone else has the same problem and is searching, I loaded the
image clone into the picturebox using the following code:

Private m_Bitmap As Bitmap ' Form level

Dim bm As New Bitmap(Imagefil eName)
m_Bitmap = New Bitmap(bm.Width , bm.Height)
Dim gr As Graphics = Graphics.FromIm age(m_Bitmap)
gr.DrawImage(bm , 0, 0)
bm.Dispose()
picPhoto.Image = m_Bitmap

The file was no longer locked - the picturebox contained a clone and I
disposed of the original file from memory. I was free to delete the file
without a file locking challenge.

Take care!

Tom (2)
--
Tom
"to************ **@uniroma1.it" wrote:

Try loading. Making a in memory copy of the image (drawimage). Dispose
original Image used for load.
Let me know...

-tom

TomA ha scritto:

Hi All,

I have a picturebox on a form containing the photo of a person. As you
advance through the records, the photo updates. Rather than storing the
images in an inefficient blob field in a table, I have the separate images
stored in an image directory with primary key as the filename (3476.jpg). If
the image exists, I display the image. All this works fine.

I have a buttons that allow for the insertion and deletion of photos. The
"add" works fine too. But I am getting errors when I attempt to delete an
image - "file is being used by another process." The only time the image is
"used" is when I display it on the form. I am assuming the form/picturebox
is locking the image (what else?). I coded the procedure to reset the image
to a default missing image photo. That did not work so I set the picturebox
to nothing first. That did not work either. I also verified the string
being passed to the delete.file method. Here is my code:
Private Sub cmdRemovePhoto_ Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e
As System.EventArg s) Handles cmdRemovePhoto. Click

Dim intReturn As Integer

intReturn = MsgBox("Delete this Photo? This cannot be reversed.",
MsgBoxStyle.Yes No + MsgBoxStyle.Que stion + MsgBoxStyle.Def aultButton2,
"Warning... ")

If intReturn = 6 Then

picPhoto.Image = Nothing

picPhoto.Image = Image.FromFile( pubGlobalSetup &
"\imageFolder\m issingphoto.jpg ")

Try

File.Delete(pub GlobalSetup & "\imageFold er\" &
LTrim(Str(intCo ntactID)) & ".jpg") ' <--Error Here

cmdRemovePhoto. Enabled = False

Catch ee As Exception

MsgBox(ee.Messa ge)

End Try

End If

End Sub

I would sure appreciate any ideas. This should be easy. I have no clue
what could be locking the file. It has to be the picturebox doesn't it? But
at the time I am deleting, it has been replaced. I checked the file
attribues at the time I delete and it is set only to "Archive". Someone in
Google had a similar problem and the respondant suggested a file.close
method. There is no such method. There is a fileclose(buffe r#) method for
datafiles.

Thanks much!
--
Tom

[tommaso.gastaldi]

It is also nice Herfried's suggestion (the second one) based on
streams.

If you do not need to resize the image, it would be interesting
to measure which one is faster, to use DrawImage or the stream.
I suspect that the second way might be faster.

If you try it out let us know!

-tom (1) :)

TomA ha scritto:

Thanks Tom (1),

Your suggestion worked. I had to make several changes in the program. In
the event someone else has the same problem and is searching, I loaded the
image clone into the picturebox using the following code:

Private m_Bitmap As Bitmap ' Form level

Dim bm As New Bitmap(Imagefil eName)
m_Bitmap = New Bitmap(bm.Width , bm.Height)
Dim gr As Graphics = Graphics.FromIm age(m_Bitmap)
gr.DrawImage(bm , 0, 0)
bm.Dispose()
picPhoto.Image = m_Bitmap

The file was no longer locked - the picturebox contained a clone and I
disposed of the original file from memory. I was free to delete the file
without a file locking challenge.

Take care!

Tom (2)
--
Tom
"to************ **@uniroma1.it" wrote:

Try loading. Making a in memory copy of the image (drawimage). Dispose
original Image used for load.
Let me know...

-tom

TomA ha scritto:

Hi All,
>
I have a picturebox on a form containing the photo of a person. As you
advance through the records, the photo updates. Rather than storing the
images in an inefficient blob field in a table, I have the separate images
stored in an image directory with primary key as the filename (3476.jpg). If
the image exists, I display the image. All this works fine.
>
I have a buttons that allow for the insertion and deletion of photos. The
"add" works fine too. But I am getting errors when I attempt to delete an
image - "file is being used by another process." The only time the image is
"used" is when I display it on the form. I am assuming the form/picturebox
is locking the image (what else?). I coded the procedure to reset the image
to a default missing image photo. That did not work so I set the picturebox
to nothing first. That did not work either. I also verified the string
being passed to the delete.file method. Here is my code:
>
>
Private Sub cmdRemovePhoto_ Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e
As System.EventArg s) Handles cmdRemovePhoto. Click
>
Dim intReturn As Integer
>
intReturn = MsgBox("Delete this Photo? This cannot be reversed.",
MsgBoxStyle.Yes No + MsgBoxStyle.Que stion + MsgBoxStyle.Def aultButton2,
"Warning... ")
>
If intReturn = 6 Then
>
picPhoto.Image = Nothing
>
picPhoto.Image = Image.FromFile( pubGlobalSetup &
"\imageFolder\m issingphoto.jpg ")
>
Try
>
File.Delete(pub GlobalSetup & "\imageFold er\" &
LTrim(Str(intCo ntactID)) & ".jpg") ' <--Error Here
>
cmdRemovePhoto. Enabled = False
>
Catch ee As Exception
>
MsgBox(ee.Messa ge)
>
End Try
>
End If
>
End Sub
>
>
>
I would sure appreciate any ideas. This should be easy. I have no clue
what could be locking the file. It has to be the picturebox doesn't it? But
at the time I am deleting, it has been replaced. I checked the file
attribues at the time I delete and it is set only to "Archive". Someone in
Google had a similar problem and the respondant suggested a file.close
method. There is no such method. There is a fileclose(buffe r#) method for
datafiles.
>
Thanks much!
--
Tom