Visual Basic is bidirectional (also known as "BiDi")-enabled. Bidirectional is a generic term used to describe software products that support Arabic and other languages which are written right-to-left. More specifically, bidirectional refers to the product ability to manipulate and display text for both left-to-right and right-to-left languages. For example, displaying a sentence containing words written in both English and Arabic requires bidirectional capability.
Microsoft Visual Basic includes standard features to create and run Windows applications with full bidirectional language functionality. However, these features are operational only when Microsoft Visual Basic is installed in a bidirectional 32-bit Microsoft Windows environment, such as Arabic Microsoft Windows 95. Other bidirectional 32-bit Microsoft Windows environments are available as well.
The RightToLeft property has been added to forms, controls, and other Visual Basic objects to provide an easy mechanism for creating objects with bidirectional characteristics. Although RightToLeft is a part of every Microsoft Visual Basic installation, it is operational only when Microsoft Visual Basic is installed in a bidirectional 32-bit Microsoft Windows environment.
Bidirectional Features documentation describes all Microsoft Visual Basic bidirectional features. You can find this information under Additional Information under Reference in the Visual Basic table of contents. Click the See Also under the title of this topic to go directly to the overview topic.
For compatibility with Microsoft Visual Basic 4.0, two versions of the 32-bit Grid control (Grid32.ocx) are included with Microsoft Visual Basic 6 but not installed. Both are located in the \Tools folder of the product media. The standard and bidirectional versions are located in the \Controls and \Controls\Bidi subfolders, respectively.