Question

I’m testing the following and trying to understand what it does to then apply it to me live app. The app seems to work with or without .SynchronizingObject = this;. I’ve looked MSDN but could do with an alternative explanation of what this line does and why I need to include it?

private void btRunProcessAndRefresh_Click_1(object sender, EventArgs e) {
    //instantiate a new process and tell it where to find file 
    myProcess =new Process();
    myProcess.StartInfo.FileName =@"notepad.exe";

    //creates an action to execute when the event exits  
    myProcess.Exited +=new EventHandler(MyProcessExited);
    myProcess.EnableRaisingEvents =true;

    //myProcess.SynchronizingObject =this;
    elapsedTime = 0;
    myProcess.Start();

    myTimer =new System.Windows.Forms.Timer();
    myTimer.Tick +=new EventHandler(TimerTickEvent);
    myTimer.Interval = SLEEP_AMOUNT;
    myTimer.Start();
}

private void MyProcessExited(Object source,EventArgs e) {
    myTimer.Stop();
}

private void TimerTickEvent(Object myObject,EventArgs myEventArgs) {
    myTimer.Stop();
    elapsedTime += SLEEP_AMOUNT;
    if (elapsedTime > MAXIMUM_EXECUTION_TIME)
        myProcess.Kill();
    else
        myTimer.Start();
}

Answer 1

See MSDN

You should set SynchronizingObject to a Windows Form component to ensure the Exited event handler executes in the thread that created the component.

If you execute your code sequence in a console application than you probably do not need to set the SynchronizingObject; but if you want to access the UI from the Exited event handler, you must set this member.