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Child Form cannot find text file

I have created a boolean algebraic simplifier. It simplifies expressions and I am content with it. However, I am trying to add a feature that allows users to check if two expressions are equivalent. For this I have created a new form that allows the user to input two expression by clicking buttons. To do this, I thought it best to simplify both expressions and then compare the two for equivalency. As I have got lots of subroutines and code that works for simplification in another form, I thought making the form a child form of the form with the code in would allow me to call the subroutines instead of copying them onto the form. I have made these protected in the parent form. I have inherited like so:
public partial class Expression_Equivalency_Form : Expression_Simplifier
However, when I click onto the form designer, this error appears and I cannot view the graphical interface of the form:
"Could not find file File Path"
The file is in the debug folder which is within the bin folder within the folder containing the program and is recongised in the parent class. The file is read from and appeneded by the parent form without issue. I have tried to research this but have been unable to find a solution. Does anyone know one?
I have read to the file and appended to it. I have also used the following code to remove any blank lines from my text file:
File.WriteAllLines("PreviousExpressionInputs.txt",
File.ReadAllLines("PreviousExpressionInputs.txt").Where(l => !string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(l)));
Code that writes to the file:
using (BinaryWriter Writer = new BinaryWriter(File.Open("PreviousExpressionInputs.txt",
FileMode.Append)))
{
Writer.Write(expressionandanswertowritetotextfile);
}
Code that reads from the file:
foreach (string line in File.ReadLines("PreviousExpressionInputs.txt"))
{
try
{
LinesInFile.Add(line);
}
catch (Exception)
{
}
}

Consider following facts:
When you open a form in design mode, the constructor of its base class will run.
When you look for a relative file name, the path will be resolved relative to the current working directory of the application.
When the form is in design mode, the current application is Visual Studio and its working directory is where the devenv.exe is located.
It describes why you cannot find your text files. Because you have some code in the constructor of your base form(or fir example load event handler of the base form) which looks for the file and since the filename is relative, its looking for the file in the Visual Studio working directory and could not find file.
How to prevent the problem? Check DesignMode property to prevent running the code:
public partial class MyBaseForm : Form
{
public MyBaseForm()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
private void MyBaseForm_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
MessageBox.Show("This will show both in run-time and design time.");
if (!DesignMode)
MessageBox.Show("This will show just in run-time");
}
}
Create the derived form and open it in designer to see what happens:
public partial class Form1 : MyBaseForm
{
public Form1()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
}
To learn more about how designer works take a look at this post.

Why can't I use a Partial Class in a VSTO Ribbon?

I'm trying to break up a very big VSTO IRibbonExtensibility class into multiple smaller classes to make things more manageable.
I tried creating a partial class with all my Visibility callbacks in it.
The code compiles fine but doesn't work in MS Word.
Error: The call to GetCustomUI() for RibbonID 'Microsoft.Word.Document' failed.
Any idea why this isn't working??
[ComVisible(true)]
public partial class Ribbon : O.IRibbonExtensibility
{
..
}
public partial class Ribbon
{
..
}

Sorry, my bad..
I had moved the Ribbon.xml file into a new folder and that caused the issue

Losing UserControl when editing winForm VS2012

I have a Form called EmployeeForm inside this form i'm including some UserControl and when I edit EmployeeForm every UserControl inside the form are lost.
This picture show a diff between TFS(left) and Local(right) file, after modifying the name of a combobox
Example of this.ucEmployeeKeyOne :
public partial class Employee_EmployeeKeyOneRelationUC
: Employee_EmployeeKeyOneRelation_GenericUC
{ [other Code Here] }
public class Employee_EmployeeKeyOneRelation_GenericUC
: RelationUC<MyObject>
{ }
and the definition of RelationUC :
public partial class RelationUC<T>
: DataUserControlBase
{ [other Code Here] }
public partial class DataUserControlBase
: UserControlBase
{ [other Code Here] }
public partial class UserControlBase
: System.Windows.Forms.UserControl, MyInterfaceHere
{ [other Code Here] }
All UserControl i'm losing are inherited from RelationUC<T>. Does the generic type of RelationUC may cause the problem?

For the Vs designer to load the controls, the control should be able to initialize including all public properties and you must have a empty constructor. If you don't have an empty constructor or have properties that are returning from the inherited nullable class, it is most likely the the designer will crash.
To Debug this,
1) open you project in VS but do not open the file that contains the controls yet;
2) open another VS and attach the process of VS that your project is opened;
3) set the break on exceptions (short cut 'CTRL + D, CTRL +E' ) to all (once you become familiar with what exception the designer is throwing, you can set that exception only.);
4) Go to the VS with you project and open the file that contain your user control. when the exception is thrown, the second VS will catch it and tell you exactly why and where.

Using a class in WPF

When I'm developing a ConsoleApp there is no problem to use classes in my Main that I've created in separated files (Project Menu --> Add Class). But later, when I try to do it in WPF that class is not recognized. I have made sure that the namespace it's the same both in my "MainWindow.xaml.cs" and my Class Canal.cs. When I define that same class but inside MainWindow.xaml.cs everything works fine, but due to the extension of the code I prefer separate it.
MainWindow.xaml.cs:
//using
namespace Tcomp
{
public partial class MainWindow : Window
{
void MainWindow_Loaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{ //Stuff but I can't use class created outside of MainWindow.xaml.cs
}
}
}
Canal.cs
//using
namespace TComp
{
public class Canal
{ //some propreties here
}
}
Thanks.

Create the class inside a library project not on a console app. And on your WPF project, add a project reference to the library project you have created.

#mcxiand already answered your question. I would like to add another option: you can use a
public partial class MainWindow : Window
and add it to as many files as you want containing your code, thus there will be no need to create additional class library. The key word here is partial, which allows the code encapsulated in this class to spread over multiple files (.cs).

You must either instantiate the Canal class:
var myClass = new Canal();
and then you can use the properties from it. Make myClass a private member of your MainWindow.xaml.cs and you can access it anytime. Or the second way, make Canal class static and then you can access it from everywhere. Hope this helps.

Alternatives to reading config files from class libraries at design time?

I have a WinForm project that contains several UserControls. This WinForm project has a reference to an assembly (lets call it lib.dll) that is created from another project (Class Library) that exists in a different solution.
Now, several of the UserControls make calls into lib.dll that return values from the app.config file. At runtime lib.dll works fine and returns the necessary data but at design time, I am getting an exception from lib.dll because the app.config sections are NULL (the exceptions are by design).
Now I could go through each control and wrap any code that calls into lib with
if(!DesignMode) { //code }
But that is a lot of controls to go and apply that to. Is there something I can do globally that would be more elegant then testing the DesignMode property?
Edit
In response to the two comments left below: the solutions provided don't appear to work. The assembly that is causing me a problem lives in the same directory as the app.config. The general directory structure looks like this
References Folder
Configurations (Folder)
appsettings.config
app.config
lib.dll
app.config pulls in several other config files (appsettings, cnx strings, etc) which reside in the Configurations directory. In the case of my exception the value I am trying to get resides in one of these ancillary config files that is referenced by app.config.

This is an interesting question. A solution could be to create in lib.dll a static class like this one :
public static class Config
{
private static readonly _param1;
static Config()
{
_param1 = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["Param1"] ?? "Your default value";
}
public static string Param1
{
get { return _param1; }
}
}
Then, in your code, insted of writing ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["Param1"], you will use Config.Param1. So you won't need to test the property DesignMode.

There are so many ways to do this, IMHO.
One thought that immedidately comes to mind would be to use an inheritance-based approach for the user controls in question? That way, in the base class, you can put that if (DesignMode) check in, and do the correct branching from there.
// if i were to visualizeyour lib.dll data initializer call like this:
class BaseUserControl
{
// i'm guessing that you initialize the data somehow...
void InitializeData()
{
if (!DesignMode)
{
InitializeDataLocal();
}
}
protected virtual InitializeDataLocal()
{
// whatever base behavior you want should go here.
}
}
// in the derived classes, just put the code you currently have for
// fetching the data from lib.dll here...
class UserControl : BaseUserControl
{
protected override InitializeDataLocal()
{
// fetch from lib.dll...
// optionally invoke some base behavior as well,
// if you need to...
base.InitializeDataLocal();
}
}