Introduction

This document contains information you'll need to design, implement, and distribute ActiveX™ designers. Microsoft^® Visual Basic versions 5.0 and later support ActiveX designers.

ActiveX designers are ActiveX components that contain a dedicated design environment with which end users can customize applications. ActiveX designers are written in a high-level language that provides ActiveX and OLE support (such as Microsoft^® Visual C++^®).

Before developing an ActiveX designer, you should be proficient with an object-oriented language and experienced in creating OLE applications and ActiveX controls.

In addition to this document, you'll need to refer to the following sources, all of which can be found in the Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN):

• Automation Programmer’s Reference
  
  
• COM Programmer’s Reference
  
  
• Inside OLE, Second Edition
  
  
• Microsoft Visual C++ product documentation

Note   ActiveX is Microsoft's brand name for the technologies that enable interoperability using the Component Object Model (COM). OLE (Object Linking and Embedding) is a special-purpose subset of ActiveX. In this document, OLE refers specifically to cases where an object is linked or embedded. ActiveX encompasses the broader technology that includes OLE, the Internet, and multimedia.