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Use an ActiveX control in your Win32 Project without MFC with CreateWindowEx or in a dialog box

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15 Apr 20072 min read 224.7K   4.8K   54   97
An article on how to use an ActiveX control in your Win32 Project without MFC with CreateWindowEx or in a dialog box
Screenshot - d.jpg

Introduction

You would really like to use the multitude of ActiveX controls available in Windows and on the Internet, however you did have to use MFC or OWL or a non native platform. The solution is here! A HWND that acts as an ActiveX container!

Using the code

In short, AX is a HWND that acts as an ActiveX container. You register its class with AXRegister():

C++
int __stdcall WinMain(HINSTANCE h,HINSTANCE,LPSTR,int)
{
    OleInitialize(0);
    if (!AXRegister())
        return 0;
    ...
}

Using the control is easy. You either use CreateWindowEx(), or specify the AX control within the RC editor:

C++
DIALOG_1 DIALOGEX 0, 0, 500, 400
...
{
    CONTROL "{8856F961-340A-11D0-A96B-00C04FD705A2}", 801, "AX", 
                WS_CHILD | WS_VISIBLE, 0, 0, 500, 400
}

As the Window Title, you use the CLSID of the ActiveX object you wish to create. Here I used the CLSID of Internet Explorer. You can find all the CLSIDs you want by using MS's OLEView.

When you call CreateWindowEx() or DialogBox() to create the window, the ActiveX object will be created, but it won't as yet be activated in place. Use AX_INPLACE (wParam = 1 to Activate , wParam = 2 to deactivate):

C++
case WM_INITDIALOG:
{
    HWND hX = GetDlgItem(hh,801);
    SendMessage(hX,AX_INPLACE,1,0)
...

And how do you access the interfaces that this ActiveX object supports? Use AX_QUERYINTERFACE, with WPARAM as a pointer to the reference ID, and LPARAM as a double pointer to the output interface. I try this with IWebBrowser2:

C++
// Navigate
IWebBrowser2* wb = 0;
SendMessage(hX,AX_QUERYINTERFACE,(WPARAM)&IID_IWebBrowser2,(LPARAM)&wb);
if (wb)
{
    wb->Navigate(L"http://www.codeproject.com",0,0,0,0);
    wb->Release();
}

Points of Interest

AX.CPP and AX.H contain more code, not yet implemented (or yet buggy!) . My plan is to allow Advise Sink connections, OLE menus etc. in the future. AX implements as few as possible of the IOleClientSite methods, for simplicity. When you further explore OLE and ActiveX, you put your own implementations there!

With the above IWebBrowser2, for example, you might need to get notified when the user clicks on a URL. This can be done using IDispatch, but it isn't simple and I won't demonstrate it here, because it depends on the ActiveX control you want to host.

Good luck!

License

This article has no explicit license attached to it but may contain usage terms in the article text or the download files themselves. If in doubt please contact the author via the discussion board below.

A list of licenses authors might use can be found here


Written By
Software Developer
Greece Greece
I'm working in C++, PHP , Java, Windows, iOS, Android and Web (HTML/Javascript/CSS).

I 've a PhD in Digital Signal Processing and Artificial Intelligence and I specialize in Pro Audio and AI applications.

My home page: https://www.turbo-play.com

Comments and Discussions

 
Questioninfo Pin
Member 94133527-Dec-16 22:40
Member 94133527-Dec-16 22:40 
QuestionMultiple controls in a window Pin
Member 1107790418-Sep-14 2:03
Member 1107790418-Sep-14 2:03 
QuestionIWebbrowser2 events in VC wihtout using MFC Pin
Member 73749128-Jul-14 22:57
Member 73749128-Jul-14 22:57 
AnswerRe: IWebbrowser2 events in VC wihtout using MFC Pin
Michael Chourdakis8-Jul-14 23:06
mvaMichael Chourdakis8-Jul-14 23:06 
GeneralRe: IWebbrowser2 events in VC wihtout using MFC Pin
Member 73749128-Jul-14 23:44
Member 73749128-Jul-14 23:44 
Generalthinks a lot Pin
kk501114-Aug-13 22:33
kk501114-Aug-13 22:33 
Questiontab and delete keys are not working Pin
venkatesh528678-May-13 20:40
venkatesh528678-May-13 20:40 
QuestionFor "ENTER" click the events are not taking place on webpage. Pin
NIKHIL788 Agrawal1-Dec-12 3:34
NIKHIL788 Agrawal1-Dec-12 3:34 
AnswerRe: For "ENTER" click the events are not taking place on webpage. Pin
Michael Chourdakis1-Dec-12 3:40
mvaMichael Chourdakis1-Dec-12 3:40 
GeneralRe: For "ENTER" click the events are not taking place on webpage. Pin
NIKHIL788 Agrawal1-Dec-12 3:46
NIKHIL788 Agrawal1-Dec-12 3:46 
GeneralRe: For "ENTER" click the events are not taking place on webpage. Pin
Michael Chourdakis1-Dec-12 3:49
mvaMichael Chourdakis1-Dec-12 3:49 
GeneralRe: For "ENTER" click the events are not taking place on webpage. Pin
NIKHIL788 Agrawal1-Dec-12 4:45
NIKHIL788 Agrawal1-Dec-12 4:45 
QuestionCan not open tax.zip Pin
40810576413-Nov-12 22:02
40810576413-Nov-12 22:02 
AnswerRe: Can not open tax.zip Pin
Michael Chourdakis14-Nov-12 5:38
mvaMichael Chourdakis14-Nov-12 5:38 
GeneralRe: Thanks Pin
40810576414-Nov-12 15:43
40810576414-Nov-12 15:43 
QuestionCanot compile Pin
ATILLA672-Oct-12 5:15
ATILLA672-Oct-12 5:15 
AnswerRe: Canot compile Pin
shint10-Apr-13 18:25
shint10-Apr-13 18:25 
main.rc

CSS
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
//
// Generated from the TEXTINCLUDE 2 resource.
//
#include "afxres.h"

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
//
// Dialog
//

DIALOG_1 DIALOGEX 0, 0, 500, 400
STYLE DS_ABSALIGN | DS_3DLOOK | DS_NOFAILCREATE | DS_CENTER | 0x200L | WS_POPUP | WS_VISIBLE | WS_CAPTION | WS_SYSMENU | WS_THICKFRAME | WS_MINIMIZEBOX | WS_MAXIMIZEBOX
CAPTION "Test IE"
FONT 8, "MS Sans Serif", 0, 0
LANGUAGE LANG_ENGLISH, SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US
{
 CONTROL "{8856F961-340A-11D0-A96B-00C04FD705A2}", 801L, "AX", WS_CHILD | WS_VISIBLE, 0, 0, 500, 400
}

GeneralThanks for this very useful article. Pin
Member 83703258-Nov-11 12:50
Member 83703258-Nov-11 12:50 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
Member 432084425-Oct-11 10:52
Member 432084425-Oct-11 10:52 
GeneralIShockwaveFlash Pin
zzz7net9-Apr-11 13:25
zzz7net9-Apr-11 13:25 
GeneralMy vote of 4 Pin
zzz7net3-Apr-11 14:34
zzz7net3-Apr-11 14:34 
GeneralContext menu Pin
basiek29-Mar-11 4:07
basiek29-Mar-11 4:07 
GeneralRe: Context menu Pin
basiek5-Apr-11 3:00
basiek5-Apr-11 3:00 
GeneralKeyboard shortucts Pin
Martin Kucera23-Jan-11 22:39
Martin Kucera23-Jan-11 22:39 
GeneralRe: Keyboard shortucts Pin
NIKHIL788 Agrawal2-Dec-12 1:59
NIKHIL788 Agrawal2-Dec-12 1:59 

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