CoTreatAsClass

Establishes or removes an emulation, in which objects of one class are treated as objects of a different class.

STDAPI CoTreatAsClass(
  REFCLSID clsidOld, 
                     //CLSID for the original object to be emulated
  REFCLSID clsidNew  //CLSID for the new object that emulates the 
                     // original
);
 

Parameters

clsidOld

[in] CLSID of the object to be emulated.

clsidNew

[in] CLSID of the object that should emulate the original object. This replaces any existing emulation for clsidOld. Can be CLSID_NULL, in which case any existing emulation for clsidOld is removed.

Return Values

This function supports the standard return value E_INVALIDARG, as well as the following:

S_OK

The emulation was successfully established or removed.

REGDB_E_CLASSNOTREG

The clsidOld parameter is not properly registered in the registration database.

REGDB_E_READREGDB

Error reading from registration database.

REGDB_E_WRITEREGDB

Error writing to registration database.

Remarks

This function sets the TreatAs entry in the registry for the specified object, allowing the object to be emulated by another application. Emulation allows an application to open and edit an object of a different format, while retaining the original format of the object. After this entry is set, whenever any function like CoGetClassObject specifies the object's original CLSID (clsidOld), it is transparently forwarded to the new CLSID (clsidNew), thus launching the application associated with the TreatAs CLSID. When the object is saved, it can be saved in its native format, which may result in loss of edits not supported by the original format.

You would call CoTreatAsClass in two situations if your application supports emulation:

• In response to an end-user request (through a conversion dialog box) that a specified object be treated as an object of a different class (an object created under one application be run under another application, while retaining the original format information).
• In a setup program, to register that one class of objects be treated as objects of a different class.

An example of the first case is that an end user might wish to edit a spreadsheet created by one application using a different application that can read and write the spreadsheet format of the original application. For an application that supports emulation, CoTreatAsClass can be called to implement a Treat As option in a conversion dialog box.

An example of the use of CoTreatAsClass in a setup program would be in an updated version of an application. When the application is updated, the objects created with the earlier version can be activated and treated as objects of the new version, while retaining the previous format information. This would allow you to give the user the option to convert when they save, or to save it in the previous format, possibly losing format information not available in the older version.

One result of setting an emulation is that when you enumerate verbs, as in the IOleObject::EnumVerbs method implementation in the default handler, this would enumerate the verbs from clsidNew instead of clsidOld.

To ensure that existing emulation information is removed when you install an application, your setup programs should call CoTreatAsClass, setting the clsidNew parameter to CLSID_NULL to remove any existing emulation for the classes they install.

If there is no CLSID assigned to the AutoTreatAs key in the registry, setting clsidNew and clsidOld to the same value removes the TreatAs entry, so there is no emulation. If there is a CLSID assigned to the AutoTreatAs key, that CLSID is assigned to the TreatAs key.

The CoTreatAsClass function does not validate whether an appropriate registry entry for clsidNew currently exists.

QuickInfo

  Windows NT: Use version 3.1 or later.
  Windows: Use Windows 95 or later.
  Windows CE: Unsupported.
  Header: Declared in objbase.h.
  Import Library: Included as a resource in ole32.dll.

See Also

CoGetTreatAsClass