You can for example use a boolean variable to indicate that the message is already shown. Something like
var dataReader = sqlDataReader1;
bool messageShown = false;
while (dataReader.Read())
{
string q = listBox1.Items.Count.ToString();
string a = Settings.Default["outercode"].ToString();
label4.Text = "(" + q + "/" + a + ")";
listBox1.Items.Add(dataReader[0]);
if (!messageShown && Convert.ToInt32(q) < Convert.ToInt32(a))
{
MessageBox.Show("No sufficient Unit codes");
messageShown = true;
}
}
EDIT
Looking at the solution you've posted, it looks like you would like to fill the listbox and if the amount of items is less than your setting then you'd like to show a message box. If that is correct, then the code could look something like
var dataReader = sqlDataReader1;
int requiredAmount = (int)Settings.Default["outercode"];
while (dataReader.Read())
{
label4.Text = $"({listBox1.Items.Count}/{requiredAmount})";
listBox1.Items.Add(dataReader[0]);
}
if (listBox1.Items.Count < requiredAmount)
{
MessageBox.Show("No sufficient Unit codes");
}
Note that the code above will cause an exception if the setting is missing or cannot be converted to
int
so you may want to use
Int32.TryParse Method (System) | Microsoft Docs[
^] and in general add proper error handling using
try-catch - C# Reference | Microsoft Docs[
^]
To better understand how your code works, refer to
Tutorial: Debug C# code - Visual Studio | Microsoft Docs[
^] to better understanding for debugging the code.