hi, I am trying to create a link for ones email address where you click the address and it open up the users default email client (outlook or whatever ). So I declare my process as a process and then do myprocess.start("mailto:") and I get an error that says. "An attempt was made to reference a token that does not exist ". Ultimatly I want to append an email address to the end of the mailto: , which I have tried but I get the same error so I'm simplifying till I get it working.

my html looks like
<code> <asp:linkbutton id="linkemail" Font-Size="10" CommandName ="EmailButton" Commandargument = '<%#databinder.eval(container.dataitem, "email")%>' text='<%#databinder.eval(container.dataitem, "email")%>' Runat="server" width="100"></asp:linkbutton> </code>

and again my vb looks like
  Dim myprocess As Process = New Process
            myprocess.Start("mailto:")

(I have cut out the cammandarguments till I can get at least a hardcoded email to work )
I also tried using a <asp:hyperlink> with the url as "mailto:" and this opens up the client but I need to have a non hardcoded value for the email address and it doesn't want to take any concantination with the mailto:

Any help is greatly appreaciated
Thanks
Raif

I think you are severely overcomplicating this:

A) Your VB code is running on the server, not the client. So you can't launch an application on the client by means of server-side code.

B) All you need to do is a simple <a> tag or hyperlink object (you just need to concatenate in the right place):

<asp:hyperlink id="linkemail" navigateurl='<%# String.Format("mailto:{0}", databinder.eval(container.dataitem, "email"))%>' text='<%#databinder.eval(container.dataitem, "email")%>' Runat="server" />

Awesome. Indeed I did overcomplicate it. However, for my edification could you please explain part of it for me? Specificaly

'<%# String.Format("mailto:{0}", databinder.eval(container.dataitem, "email"))%>'

so I guess the string.format concatinates the values of whatever objects are in the () and returns a string. so if that part is right the next question is what is the {0} with in quotes do/mean. I have seen it before and just sort of hoped it would go away but obviously I need to embrace it.

Thanks for the solution and thanks for the explanation
Raif

{0} is the replacement token for String.Format. The basic forms of that method are:
String.Format(formatstring, object)
String.Format(formatstring, object, object)
String.Format(formatstring, object, object, object)

For each, you use {0}, {1} and {2} for the three possible replacement tokens. That way you can construct strings from fixed strings and variables without the need for the typical (old style) concatenation: "..." & strVar & "..."
It's more efficient and much easier to read and write.

You can expand the format's to actually format the input:

   String.Format("I made ${0:#,###.00} this year.", 3)

This would give you "I made $3.00 this year."