June 25, 1996
Which tools are available today for designing Web pages using ActiveX controls?
Do I need to be a programmer to use ActiveX controls?
Is the user notified that a component is being downloaded?
Is the control installed permanently on the user's machine, and where is it installed?
Which controls available today from Microsoft will work well with Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1?
Where can I get these controls?
Which ActiveX controls are available today from third-party software vendors?
Once I install these controls, how can I develop ActiveX Web pages that use them?
How does the HTML Layout Control enhance my ability to create pages using ActiveX controls?
ActiveX controls are reusable software components created by a variety of software vendors. These controls can be used to quickly add specialized functionality to Web sites, desktop applications, and development tools. For example, a stock ticker control could be used to add a live stock ticker to a Web page, or an animation control could be used to add animation features to a Web page. ActiveX controls are a superset of the OLE control (OCX) and Java applet component technologies. Java applets are not supported in Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1 release, but they will be in the next beta update.
Today there are over 2,000 commercially available ActiveX controls. ActiveX controls can be created using a variety of programming languages such as C, C++, the next version of Visual Basic®, and Java. Once created, ActiveX controls can be used by designers and developers as prefabricated components to quickly create custom applications. Using ActiveX controls in such a manner does not require knowledge of how the component was created, and in many cases requires no programming whatsoever. The Internet Explorer 3.0 Web browser is the first Web browser to support ActiveX controls in Web pages. ActiveX controls can also be viewed in the Netscape Navigator using the ActiveX Plug-in for Netscape (see http://www.ncompass.com).
You can use the ActiveX Control Pad to easily insert ActiveX controls into your HTML Web pages. You can download a free beta copy of the ActiveX Control Pad from the Control Pad pages on this site. To learn how to use this tool, follow the ActiveX Control Pad tutorial, also provided on that page. Over the coming months, many other Web authoring tools from Microsoft and third parties will support authoring Web pages with ActiveX controls.
Knowledge of a scripting language such as Visual Basic Scripting Edition (VBScript) or JavaScript is helpful, but not required. Some controls require some amount of scripting in order to be fully integrated into a Web page, but many others do not. The ActiveX Control Pad allows even non-programmers to insert many controls by simply pointing and clicking, without requiring any programming.
When Internet Explorer 3.0 encounters a Web page with an ActiveX control (or multiple controls), it first checks the user's local system registry to find out if that component is available on their machine. If it is, it will display the Web page by activating the control within the Web page. If the control is not already installed on the user's computer, Internet Explorer 3.0 will automatically find and install the component over the Web, based on a location specified by the developer creating the page.
The Web page developer provides this information by setting the CODEBASE property for the control. When using the ActiveX Control Pad, this property can be easily set using the visual property table in the Object Editor. The developer can specify a URL location or set of locations where the control can be found and downloaded on the Internet. Internet Explorer will then use this information to locate the control, and download the component automatically. After the download, the Web page will be displayed. See the "Safe Web Surfing with the Internet Component Download Service" article in the July 1996 edition of the Microsoft Systems Journal for detailed information on how this works.
Yes. When a component needs to be downloaded, Internet Explorer, by default, will display a message notifying the user of the download. The user can choose to cancel the download or proceed. In addition, if the control has been digitally signed, a digital certificate will be displayed with the name of the software vendor supplying the control, and verifying that the control has not been tampered with. Controls can be digitally signed by the software developer when the control is created. The information is carried by the control itself. Thus the digital certificate will be displayed automatically before downloading with no development work required by the person who creates the Web page(s) that utilize the control. (See the on this site for more information on digital signatures.)
Is the control installed permanently on the user's machine, and where is it installed?
By default, controls are downloaded into an ActiveX control cache. Currently (with the Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1 release), this cache is permanent.
The Component Download Service in Internet Explorer 3.0 supports versioning, so that new versions of the control can be detected and automatically downloaded as required. See "Safe Web Surfing with the Internet Component Download Service" article in the July 1996 edition of the Microsoft Systems Journal for detailed information on how this works.
ActiveX controls include a mechanism to prevent the unlicensed use of controls in Web pages. Today, this mechanism is supported in development tools such as Visual Basic and Microsoft Access, and will also be supported in the final release of the Internet Explorer 3.0. The licensing mechanism works by allowing controls to be distributed with either a developer license, or with a run-time license. With a developer license, a user can use the control for development purposes in developer tools such as Visual Basic, the ActiveX Control Pad, and similar tools. With a run-time license, the user can only view the control within an existing application or Web page, but cannot insert the control into a tool for further development purposes. Supporting the licensing mechanism is up to the individual control vendor. Some control vendors choose not to implement the licensing mechanism, so their controls can be used for development purposes by anyone once they are installed on the computer. Other control vendors permit royalty-free redistribution of the run-time version of the control only, while charging for the developer license. Users should read the license agreement provided with the control to understand how they can distribute a control on the Web.
The Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1 release does not yet support the ActiveX control licensing mechanism. Because of this, it will only display controls for which the user has a developer license, or controls that do not implement a license check at run time. For example, unless the user has Visual Basic 4.0 installed (which installs a developer license for all of the controls that ship with Visual Basic 4.0), they will not be able to see the controls supplied by Visual Basic in a Web page. This issue will be fully addressed before the final release of Internet Explorer 3.0. In the final release, existing controls, including all the Visual Basic 4.0 controls, can be distributed with a runtime-only license by developers creating Web pages. Thus, users browsing these Web pages can have the controls automatically downloaded as necessary so the controls are fully functional (but not insertable) in Web pages. Many controls available today from Microsoft and third parties can be used with Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1. Microsoft and third parties will also be supplying many more ActiveX controls for royalty-free run-time use on the Web. Check the Internet Explorer controls page for details.
The following 24 controls are available from Microsoft and will work immediately in Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1 because they do not require a license check at run time. These include the following.
Controls that ship with Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1 (see the Internet Explorer page):
Control Name | Description |
Shell Explorer control | A Web browser control that can display HTML pages and other ActiveX cocuments. |
Marquee control | A control that can scroll text messages at a developer-defined speed. |
Controls that ship with the ActiveX Control Pad and the HTML Layout Control (see the ActiveX Control Pad page):
Control Name | Description |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Label | A control used for creating basic text labels. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Textbox | A multiline text entry and text display window. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Combo Box | A control that allows users to choose from a drop-down list of options. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 List Box | A control that allows users to choose from a scrollable list of options. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 CheckBox | A control that allows user to check an option. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Option Button | A control that allows users to choose between multiple options. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Toggle Button | A button that has a toggle state (for example, on/off). |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Command Button | A basic pushbutton control. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Tabstrip | A control that provides multiple pages that can be selected via tabs. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 ScrollBar | Basic horizontal and vertical scroll bars. |
Microsoft Forms 2.0 Spin Button | A button that can be pushed up or down. |
The Microsoft Image Control | A control that can display progressively rendered images in metafile, .JPG, .GIF, .BMP or wavelet formats. |
The HTML Layout Control | A control that can display 2-D HTML regions inside of Internet Explorer 3.0 using new W3C extensions to HTML. |
Controls that are available on the Internet Explorer 3.0 Web site (see the Internet Explorer Controls page):
Control Name | Description |
Animated Button | A pushbutton that can display different images when pressed. |
Chart | A control that can chart data in a variety of chart formats. |
Gradient | A control that can be used to created gradient color fills in Web pages. |
Label | A control that can display text labels at any angle. |
New Item | A control that will display an image only up until a certain date. |
Pop-up Menu | A control that adds pop-up menus to Web pages. |
Pre-loader | A control that can preload images and other components into the local cache. |
Stock Ticker | A control that can display real-time market data. |
Timer | A control that can be programmed to execute actions/scripts at set time intervals. |
Powerpoint Animation Player | A control that can display PowerPoint presentations and animations over the Web. |
Note that other controls will be by made available on an ongoing basis, including additional controls that will ship with the final release of Internet Explorer 3.0. We will be publishing an updated list as soon as possible.
The controls can be downloaded online. The controls listed above that ship with Internet Explorer will be installed when you install Internet Explorer 3.0 Beta 1. The controls listed that ship with the ActiveX Control Pad will be installed when you download and install the ActiveX Control Pad. Controls that are available on the Internet Explorer 3.0 Web site can be downloaded from the Web page specified above. In all cases, use the URLs listed in the tables above to download the components.
There are over 2,000 commercially available controls from third-party software vendors. See the ActiveX Control Vendors pages for a list of companies developing Internet-enhanced ActiveX controls.
Use the ActiveX Control Pad to insert these controls into your HTML Web pages. Follow the ActiveX Control Pad tutorial to learn how to use this tool. (See the ActiveX Control Pad pages on this Web site.)
The HTML Layout Control supports new HTML extensions published by the WorldWide Web Consortium (W3C) that allow objects to be positioned exactly on a Web page. Previously, HTML did not allow Web developers to exactly position elements on a page using specific x,y coordinates, and did not allow overlapping objects. These "2-D" layout capabilities help developers create more sophisticated designs and Web applications for their users. By implementing these new W3C HTML extensions, the HTML Layout Control provides advanced layout options for ActiveX Controls displayed in Internet Explorer 3.0. The HTML Layout Control is an add-on for Internet Explorer 3.0 and will be fully integrated into the final release of the browser. The ActiveX Control Pad can be used in conjunction with the HTML Layout Control, since it provides a full frame-based WYSIWYG page editor that makes it easy to create advanced, 2-D-style HTML designs using ActiveX controls.
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© 1996 Microsoft Corporation