>>>yes it is composite...
>>>
>>>Thanks
>>>
>>>Tommy
>>>
>>>>>>Lots of ways,
>>>>
>>>>Tommy,
>>>>One more way is to Return .F. from Init and the object won't even exist. However, if it is a composite class, this can be dangerous because the programmer may not check before trying to access the object and if not, BOOM!
>>
>>Putting the .visible=.f. into the .refresh may be an overkill. I'd put it in form's .init, somewhere in the end and surely after any dodefault(). If it still gets to be visible, someone in the parent class is stubborn and brings the darn thing to life too often - then this sort of overkill does need a counter-overkill :)
>
>Yeah, I had to resort to overkill!!! That was one stubbon set of controls... but all is well at the moment!!

Just one more idea - if you can't kill it (sufficient number of times), hide the corpse under the carpet. Instead of .visible=.f., put .left=-2*thisform.width in its .init - that should keep the parent code happy, as it can set it visible all it wants, and the beast wouldn't be really visible.

I do hate solutions which rely on extensive mumbo-jumbo in form's refresh :)