C#-ConsoleApp: How to turn off console notifications.

[akipng]

Hello
I developing console application that sometimes writes some information to console using Console.WriteLn or Console.Write.
Is it possible to turn on/off displaying of messages that will be written out into console?

Sometimes I don't want anything to be written in the console and sometimes I need it. I hope someone knows solution to this.

thanks
AkipNG

[Plater]

comment out the WriteLn() and Write() calls?

or

put them in a wrapper function that has logic to know if it should or should not write to the console:

public void WriteLine(string msg)
{
   if (ShouldWrite)
   {
      Console.WriteLn(msg);
   }
}

[akipng]

comment out the WriteLn() and Write() calls?

or

put them in a wrapper function that has logic to know if it should or should not write to the console:

public void WriteLine(string msg)
{
   if (ShouldWrite)
   {
      Console.WriteLn(msg);
   }
}

Thank you for input.
This is not solution I was looking for. Some of the dll's I use generates console output and I can't use wrapper method on in that libraries.

Is there an other way to turn off console? Something like ECHO OFF in old dos scripts?

thanks
AkipNG

[Plater]

You can redirec the ouput stream to elsewhere with Console.SetOut( ) (and also .SetIn() and SetError())
Give a quick check in MSDN on them, should accomplish what you're looking for.

[akipng]

You can redirec the ouput stream to elsewhere with Console.SetOut( ) (and also .SetIn() and SetError())
Give a quick check in MSDN on them, should accomplish what you're looking for.

Great!
That worked out. I saved current console 'Console.Out' in 'saveOut' variable and when I need to call a Console command I switch it and post it then switch back to TextWriter.Null . So no other text is spamming console.

private TextWriter saveOut=null;
public void WriteToConsole(messageToConsole)
{
if (saveOut==null) // first time use
                saveOut = Console.Out;
            Console.SetOut(saveOut); 
            Console.WriteLine(messageToConsole);
            Console.SetOut(TextWriter.Null);
}

Thank you :)
AkipNG

[akipng]

The solution provided above only works when application uses Console static object to write messages.
Unfortunately I use library (dll) that still writes messages to console, I believe that library is written in c++ and uses system calls to do that.
Anyway to stop it? maybe intercept the message in WndProc that cause the console message placement, how?

thanks
AkipNG

[RBGames]

Was googling how to do this and found this post. Using this info and some other posts I put this together. Maybe someone else will land here and find this useful. BTW, this is C# 10.0.

public static class ConsoleEx
{
    private static TextWriter? defaultConsoleOut = null;

    public static void SetEcho(bool flag)
    {
        if (defaultConsoleOut == null) defaultConsoleOut = Console.Out;

        if (flag)
        {
            Console.SetOut(defaultConsoleOut);
        }
        else
        {
            Console.SetOut(TextWriter.Null);
        }
    }
}

Usage would be:

// turn console output off
ConsoleEx.SetEcho(false);

// turn console output on
ConsoleEx.SetEcho(true);