Windows form show hide control not working as expacted

Question

I have my code and problem like below

step1.Visible = true; 
//step1 is visible if i retrun from here but if do some work like below than its not visible until the task is completed
Thread.Sleep(5000); // some opration here  Thread.Sleep is just for example
step1.Visible = true;// step1 visible here not before thread going to sleep

Here I want to show the image for each step but first step image not showing if it's followed by some long running task any idea/trick show step1 in the case of Thread.Sleep(5000)?

Answer 1

Use Application.DoEvents() before your Sleep (Any long running) Code. Application.DoEvents() will processes all Windows messages currently in the message queue.

step1.Visible = true; 

// Below 3 lines are not necessary. Use it only if DoEvents() doesn't work.
//step1.Invalidate();
//step1.Update();
//step1.Refresh();

// Will process the pending request of step1.Visible=true;
Application.DoEvents();

Thread.Sleep(5000);
step1.Visible = true;

Answer 2

I'm not sure if I understand what do you want to do but first I will use those two function : Show() and Hide()

Now you have to work with Multi Threading and comunication between Threads

Hope this could help

Answer 3

You should use delegates or backgroundworker process to achieve that. you can get and idea from the link below.

Animated GIF in Windows Form while executing long process

Thanks