Matthias

@mothra: this doesn't solve the problem. the problem is when exactly to start time consuming operations (with or without visual feedback) therefore it would pe practicable to know, when exactly the form is finisched loading. @Klogg: I am not sure if I already tried this, but I fear that the event form.load is fired BEFORE the form loads by definition and therefore I can hardly imagine that a "me.show" would do anything in this situation. The form already got that command when the load event fires. But I will try and tell you if it worked. Also I am not interested to change anything with the Load event, because I usually need it the way it is. I only need an additional event or something alike to start processes AFTER the loading of the form. (when the form drawing is finished) It doesn't help to call anything from the form.load eventhandler, because the form will always fail to display before the Form_Load Procedure is completely finished.

ps maybe i should try it on my notebook which is runbning on win xp home (preinstalled, not my choice)

msde i was already thinking that msde could be the solution, but i totally fail to launch/install it on my windows 2003 server (enterprise edition) after the install (auth. mode set to database) the SQL-Server-like notify icon appeares, but I can't select a service (nor server), so the thing isn't startable. btw: how do I distribute msde databases? (pretending I had already managed to install it on my machine ;-) ) Is it enough to provide a file + my application or are there dll's, drivers, services (...) to install at the customer's machine? thanks matthias

Thanks for the tip, but most of my programs do have splash screens. But this doesn't help for forms which appear much later in the work-process. Furthermore I am looking for an elegant, simple solution, like e.g. some methode for finding out if a form's elements are finished loading.

Usually I do initialisation routines in Form.OnLoad Events (i code vb.net), but the problem with this event is, that it fires BEFORE the Form is displayed. Some things (especially if they take some time) should start the moment the form is finished loading. (so we can give visual feedback over the progress) There are events like OnActivated, but they have the disadvantage of beeing called every time the Form is activated and not only the first time. I usually do a workaround with the Activated-Event, but this is not really satisfying. Is there a better way? How do you solve this?

I used to work with SQL-Servers or text db's until now. Now is the first time, that I need a medium size solution. I am thinking about an access mdb, but I am not sure: do the customers need to have office (access) installed, if I want to access it from my app with ado.net? (i write in vb) The customers don't have internet and some even don't have office installed. And they are all beginners (most of them aquired their machine just for my prog) (They do have the newest .NET Framework)