Leveraging Visual Basic with
ActiveX Controls

Written by: Wayne S. Freeze
Published by: Prima Publishing, 1996
ISBN: 0-7615-0901-1

Overview

Would you like to have your application display help information using HTML documents rather than standard help files?
How about having your application send you email when a problem occurs?
Does enabling your application to transfer files to another system using FTP interest you?

While Internet gurus have been doing things like this for years, Visual Basic programmers can also take advantage of these capabilities. Microsoft has created a set of ActiveX controls, called the Internet Control Pack, that makes it possible to include these functions and more into your Visual Basic programs.

Leveraging Visual Basic with ActiveX Controls builds on your knowledge of Visual Basic and shows how these controls can be incorporated into your own applications. The book starts out by discussing how TCP/IP and TCP/IP applications work over the Internet. Then it discusses in detail how each of the ActiveX controls work and how they can be used to build your own FTP, News, EMail, and Web Browser programs.

In addition to the standard Internet programs, the book also presents a comprehensive program called NetRunner. This program incorporates all of the ActiveX controls into a single program with a number of innovative features such as a scrolling bar that displays the subject line of interesting news articles, and a web browser that walks through the Internet displaying each web page it encounters on a grid of up to nine by nine web pages.

Written in a straightforward, easy to understand style, Leveraging Visual Basic with ActiveX Controls is the reference you need to understand how to develop Internet programs with Visual Basic. Included with the book is a CD-ROM with the complete source code for all of the programs, the ActiveX Internet Control Pack and lots of useful shareware programs that will help you to conquer the Internet.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What happened to the ICP?

The Internet Connection Package was sold by Microsoft to a company called NetManage. NetManage has in turn sold the ICP to a new company called NetMasters, LLC. NetMasters intends to release a new version of the package called FastNet ActiveX in August 97 and will cost $550.

2. What about the expiration date in the ICP?

You can download a newer version of the software going to www.netmastersllc.com and downloading the FastNet ActiveX. The file name is AX702des.EXE and is occupies about 5 megabytes. While NetMasters does not charge for this software, it provides no source code, no support and doesn't permit you to redistribute it. However it does include all of the ActiveX objects used in this book, so you can try all of the examples.

3. Why didn't Microsoft release the ICP with Visual Basic 5?

This is one question for which I don't have an answer. While buggy, the ICP offered many features beyond those provided with Visual Basic 5's Internet Transfer control. I always that believed that the problems could be fixed and the range of functions available would be much very useful to the average Visual Basic programmer.

My own personal opinion is that the ICP offered a real alternative to many of Microsoft's APIs. For example, instead of using MAPI, you could use POP and SMTP. Instead of using Internet Explorer, you could use the HTTP and HTMP controls. In the long run Microsoft probably made the right choice, since it would be difficult to maintain two HTML engines. But, I still will miss the SMTP and POP functions (and I was hoping for an IMAP control) and will have to wait for Microsoft to offer those functions in Visual Basic 6.