Visual Basic 6 ActiveX Control FAQ and resources for Visual Basic programmers and developers... Web resources are dwindling with the loss of Microsoft support for Visual Basic 6.0. If you know of archives for the ActiveX information, please send along the URL and I will list it. Thank you.

There are three very broad categories of controls in Visual Basic 6:

1. Intrinsic Controls: The IDE buttons and frame controls. They are inside the Visual Basic .exe file. The are always in the toolbox.
2. ActiveX controls exist as separate files with a .ocx file name extension. These include controls that are available in all editions of Visual Basic and those that are available only in the Professional and Enterprise editions (such as Listview, Toolbar, Animation, and Tabbed Dialog). Third-party ActiveX controls are also available. When you see a .vbx file extension they are older controls written for previous versions of Visual Basic. Default behavior has been to replace the .vbx control with an .ocx control, but only if an .ocx version of the control is available.
3. Insertable Objects (like the Excel Worksheet object; with a list of the employees, or a Project Calendar object having the scheduling information for a project.) These can be added to the toolbox, so they can be considered controls. Some of these objects also support Automation (formerly OLE), whilch allows you to program another application's objects from within a Visual Basic application. Refer to Chapter 9 of the Visual Basic 6.0 Programmer's Guide.

   To Add an ActiveX Control to the toolbox:

• From the Project Menu, choose Components.
• Select the check box next to the name of the .ocx control, and then choose OK. Once a control is placed in the toolbox, you can add it to a form just as you would an intrinsic control.¹

 
¹ Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Programmer's Guide, page 224; ISBN 1-57231-873-2; Microsoft Press.

 
   To Remove an ActiveX Control from the Project:

• Remove all instances of the control and any reference code from each of the forms in the project. If references to the deleted control are still in the code, you will see an error message when you try to compile the application.
• From the
  Project menu, choose Components. Clear the check box next to the name of the .ocx control, and then choose OK. An error message will display if there are remaining instances of the control in your project.¹

ComponentSource.com Featured ActiveX / COM Components in easy to navigate database for your perusal and needs determination. Only the serious developer/programmer here.
 
About ActiveX Controls Includes a discussion of the security issues of ActiveX controls.
 
ActiveX Controls at Teebo Software Solutions This is a third-party vendor; look at their tabs and other products which you may want to add to one of your projects.(added 7/22/03)
 
Developing COM/ActiveX Components with Visual Basic 6.0(e-book)
 
Active-X.Com
A few free controls, trialware, and a large searchable collection of commercial controls.
 
Components at DevPower Solutions
Has several free ActiveX controls you may want to look at.
 
Gracemere Software
The site offers a freeware "lite" version of Access Maintainer, a utility which automates the compaction of MS Access databases. There is also a new IP-post utility which is designed to redirect traffic from a designated internet page to your PC using dynamic IP allocation.
 
ActiveX Components by Alvaro Redondo
 
Barcodes VB6 and .NET
 
ActiveX Controls: Refining the Control
 
Advanced VB topics at VBWire.com
 

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