Label won't change color until after code is finished executing

Question

It\'s a lot of irrelevant code to look through.. but pretty much it sends a packet and listens for a packet in return

if i comment the part out where it calls the Receiv

Answer 1

Your UI thread is blocked by calls to things like _udpClient.Connect() and _udpClient.Send() (and the receives, too)

A workaround would be to leverage the task parallel library and perform communications asynchronously to avoid blocking the UI thread.

It will manage threads for you as long as you define tasks properly. Holler if you need an example.

protected void SomeButton_Click(Object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    // Task off the work and do not wait, no blocking here.
    Task.Run(PerformConnection);
}

private async Task PerformConnection()
{
    // This method acts the way a thread should.  We await the result of async comms.
    // This will not block the UI but also may or may not run on its own thread.
    // You don't need to care about the threading much.
    var conn = await ListenerOrSomething.AwaitConnectionsAsync( /* ... */ );

    // Now you have your result because it awaited.
    using(var newClient = conn.Client())
    {
        var buffer = new byte[];           
        var recv = await newClient.ReceiveAsyncOrSomething(out buffer);

        // Data received is not zero, process it or return
        if(recv > 0)
            newClient.Response = await ProcessRequest(buffer);
        else
            return;
    }
}