finally block not executing after Application.Run(new main_form)

Question

I wanted to have some code execute before my program exited, so I thought that editing to the VS created Program.cs to look like:

...
try
{
    Application.Run(new main_form);
}
finally
{
    special_shutdown_code();
}
...

would do the trick, but my special_shutdown_code() is not being executed when I click the [x] in the upper right corner of the main form. I went back and added print statements:

...
try
{
    System.Console.WriteLine("Before");
    Application.Run(new main_form);
    System.Console.WriteLine("After");
}
finally
{
    System.Console.WriteLine("finally");
    special_shutdown_code();
}
System.Console.WriteLine("post-finally");
...

"Before" was the only output printed.

From what I've read the Application.Run functions should return. I'm at a lost. Any explanations would be appreciated.

This is a C++/CLR + C# + C mixed program, but the main part is C#.

I'm hoping to get an explanation for what is not happening rather than suggestions for how to accomplish the same functionality. I am able to work around this for most cases, but what seemed like the cleanest, easiest to understand, and the right way to do it not working at all confuses me.

Answer 1

You could try:

Form mainForm = new MainForm();
mainForm.Closing += delegate(...)
{

};
Application.Run(mainForm);

Not sure if this would actually work...

Answer 2

I came across the answer while looking into running message pumps on threads without a main form.

There are 3 versions of Application.Run(). I've found very little good information on using the version that takes no arguments. The one I see the most is Application.Run(Form), which I believe ends up calling Application.Run(new ApplicationContext(Form)) possibly after doing some setup. This sets the `ApplicationContext.MainForm