Release 10.1A: OpenEdge Development:
Programming Interfaces

ActiveX Control Support

An ActiveX control (OCX) is a reusable component built on the Microsoft Component Object Model (COM) that allows you to extend the user interface and functionality of a OpenEdge application. Some controls are similar to 4GL widgets, such as combo boxes and radio sets. There are a wide variety of additional user interface controls that are not available as built-in 4GL widgets, such as spin buttons, various dialogs, meters, and picture controls. There are also nongraphical controls for such tasks as communications and time keeping that have no user interface.

This chapter describes the mechanics of working with ActiveX controls in the 4GL. It does not fully explain how to use the OpenEdge AppBuilder to incorporate ActiveX controls in an application. For information on using the AppBuilder to work with ActiveX controls, see OpenEdge Development: AppBuilder . The information in this chapter relies on Progress support for COM objects. For information on COM objects in Progress, see Chapter 14, " Using COM Objects in the 4GL."

This chapter contains the following sections:

How Progress supports ActiveX controls
Creating a control instance in Progress
Orienting a control in the user interface at design time
Accessing ActiveX controls at runtime
Managing ActiveX controls at runtime
Handling events
Programming ActiveX controls in the AppBuilder
ActiveX controls and examples installed with Progress