CSLA .NET

My application is designed on Ptracker and uses WinPart. My mainform is using the following routines to load the winpart control after the menu is item is selected:

 Private Sub chosenToolStripMenuItem_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs)
      Dim currentAssembly As Assembly = Assembly.GetAssembly(GetType(MainForm))
      Dim mi As ToolStripMenuItem = DirectCast(sender, ToolStripMenuItem)
      Dim classToInstantiate As String = "MyAppWin." + DirectCast(mi.Tag, String)
      Dim selectedForm As System.Object = currentAssembly.CreateInstance(classToInstantiate)
      ShowSelectedForm(DirectCast(selectedForm, WinPart))
 End Sub
  
 Public Sub ShowSelectedForm(ByVal formToLoad As WinPart)
      ' see if this form is already loaded
      For Each ctl As Control In MainFormPanel.Controls
         If TypeOf ctl Is WinPart Then
            If formToLoad.GetIdValue().Equals(DirectCast(ctl, WinPart).GetIdValue()) Then
               ' project already loaded so just
               ' display the existing winpart
               ShowWinPart(DirectCast(ctl, WinPart))
               formToLoad.Dispose()
               Return
            End If
         End If
      Next...

Private Sub AddWinPart(ByVal part As WinPart)
     AddHandler part.CloseWinPart, AddressOf CloseWinPart
      part.BackColor = ToolStrip1.BackColor
      MainFormPanel.Controls.Add(part)
      Me.DocumentsToolStripDropDownButton.Enabled = True
      ShowWinPart(part)
 End Sub

In some cases I want to send a parameter to the Winpart control but am unsure of the best way to accomplish this. I realize that this is mostly a .NET question but I know other are using the winpart design and likely have a solution implemented.  My first instinct is to go with an optional parameter in ShowSelectedForm but after reading about the use of optinal parameters I think this is poor design.

I have created a winpart control which contains the reportviewer control for a specific report. All works well for the single report but now I I need to make this control generic so I can use a single winpart control for all my reports. This control will accept a report name and then based on this name will aquire the correct  datasoure, perform binding etc. I am unsure how to add the report name parameter in this case.

Any advice is truly appreciated.

Hi Sergey,

Thanks for pointing the way. I ended up going with the following which seems to work, any suggestions for improvement are welcome.

' Split the tag string into class name and parameter
If classToInstantiate.Contains(",") Then
   parmString = Mid(classToInstantiate, InStr(classToInstantiate, ",") + 1)
   classToInstantiate = Mid(classToInstantiate, 1, InStr(classToInstantiate, ",") - 1)
   selectedForm = Activator.CreateInstance(Type.GetType(classToInstantiate), New Object() {parmString})
Else
   selectedForm = currentAssembly.CreateInstance(classToInstantiate)
End If

I read some up on best practices for .Net and removed references to Microsoft.VisualBasic.dll assembly and use native .NET types instead:

  ' Split the tag string into class name and parameter
      If tagClassToInstantiate.Contains(",") Then
         tagParm = tagClassToInstantiate.Substring(tagClassToInstantiate.IndexOf(",", 0) + 1)
         tagClassToInstantiate = tagClassToInstantiate.Substring(0, tagClassToInstantiate.IndexOf(tagParm, 0) - 1)

         selectedForm = Activator.CreateInstance(Type.GetType(tagClassToInstantiate), New Object() {tagParm})
      Else
         selectedForm = currentAssembly.CreateInstance(tagClassToInstantiate)
      End If