C#. How can I give all labels in my form the same name, so if an object bounds with one of the labels that it will show something

Question

I am making a little game with c#. But i have a lot of labels in my form and if an object bounds with one of the labels it most return a textbox, but it is too much code to write that. So, how can I give all the labels one name?

This is what I have now, but when I move my object(label) it will show MessageBoxes without Boundsing with other labels:

private void timer1_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {
            if (mUp == true) player.Top -= 1;
            if (mDown == true) player.Top += 1;
            if (mLeft == true) player.Left -= 1;
            if (mRight == true) player.Left += 1;

            foreach (var allLabels in this.Controls)
                if (allLabels is Label)
                    if (player.Bounds.IntersectsWith((allLabels as Label).Bounds))
                    {
                        MessageBox.Show("hi");
                        break;
                    }
        }

this is what happens if I set a breakpoint on the MessageBox.Show line.

Answer 1

Does this logic apply to every Label on the form? If so then you can find them dynamically in the Controls collection. Perhaps something like this:

foreach (var label in this.Controls)
    if (label is Label)
        if (player.Bounds.IntersectsWith((label as Label).Bounds))
        {
            MessageBox.Show("hi");
            break;
        }

Or without the loops and nesting:

if (this.Controls.Where(c => c is Label).Any(c => player.Bounds.IntersectsWith((c as Label).Bounds)))
    MessageBox.Show("hi");

Or if there's only a subset of labels to which this applies then you can store them explicitly in a collection on the class (perhaps in the constructor) and then loop over that collection. Same logic, but you'd loop over your collection instead of over this.Controls .

Depending on how much you want to abstract this, another option could be to create your own class (perhaps called something like IntersectableLabel ) which inherits from Label . Make all of your relevant labels instances of that class instead of Label . (I'm not sure what effect this may have on the forms designer honestly, it's been a very long time since I've used Windows Forms.) Then you can loop over this.Controls and look for is IntersectableLabel , which would filter out any labels you don't want to use.

Note that if your labels are ever nested in other controls then you may need a recursive function instead of a simple loop.