The new version of Visual Basic will compile only those portions ofcode it expects to run. This speeds load time, but the code may not befully checked. To fully compile

Early binding can be done with Excel 5.0 and 7.0 by taking advantageof two bugs in Excel. The first bug cannot do direct early binding. Thesecond bug is an unexposed

The on-line documentation on using the RichText control to print tellshow it is supposed to work. It does not mention two basic problems. First,the RichText control doesn’t work with the

The benefit of early binding is that performance improves and code doesnot need to be localized for each international version of Word. This istrue only for the function that is

In VB3, you call GetModuleUsage() to determine when an app you startedwith the Shell command was complete. However, this call does not work correctlyin the 32-bit arena of Windows NT

You can use the code window to see the events for an OCX, and the propertieswindow to see the properties of an OCX. To see the OCX’s methods, use theObject

To use numeric strings as keys in a treeview control, the keys mustbe strings containing a non-numeric character, not just digits. A handyworkaround is to append the string “_” to

Do you need to tab through all those edit boxes? Are you tired of coding all of their KeyPress events? If so, set the tab indexes as you normally would.

The setup kit supplied with VB has a DLL with a useful function thatcan be called from your own applications. The function, GetFreeDiskSpace,returns the amount of free space available on

Normally, to load a new OCX, you select Custom Controls from the VB4Tools menu. Then, in the Custom Controls dialog, click on the browse button,select the OCX file, and click

In almost every application’s project you come across, fields necessitate the use of numeric text boxes-text boxes that should accept only numeric values. You can deal with this situation by

To signal errors from within a class method, use the Error.Raise methodand bubble it back up to the server. Check the docs for Error.Raise andthe books online. One caveat is

The SetupWizard directly supports only self-registering OLE servers.The setup toolkit doesn’t directly support a server that requires a REGfile. A workaround is use the Add Files button to add an

Windows 95 uses an extra step when searching for 16-bit DLLs. A newregistry key, “Known16DLLs,” in Windows 95 under \HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESystemCurrentControlSetCon-trolSessionManagerfunctions in a similar way to KnownDLLs in Windows NT. Known16DLLs

The tip “Leap Year Rules” [“101 Hot Tech Tips for VB Developers,” Supplement to the August 1996 issue of VBPJ, page 22] illustrated how to easily determine if any given

Here is a tip that should make life simpler for all VB programmers doing mixed 16/32-bit development in VB4 under Windows 95. I have three additional items in my project

The tip you published on page 70 of the September 1996 issue of VBPJ on “Validating Numeric Input” was a good tip. However, the function failed to take into account

I use a housekeeping routine to check the state of tables during system initialization. The routine tests whether the table is in a collection, whether the table has data, and

To put a combo box on a toolbar, create a place holder and positionthe combo box above the place holder in the z-order. You can’t place thecombo box inside the

Need a fast way to print only one sub or function in VB3 that also takes care of the problem some printers have in printing the last page?Create a small

In VB3, the PostMessage API can cancel an error during Form_Load. Theform unloads if you send a WM_CLOSE message to the loaded window in theerror handler of the Form_Load routine.

To draw a selected transparent image in VB4 from an Imagelist control,as you do in C++, follow these steps. The ImageList_ API functions have many features that weren’t passedthrough in

Do you need to convert user input to all upper case in VB3? All the ways I have seen to force user input to all upper case is to make

To test whether a date falls on a weekend, you might be inclined to do this: nDay = weekday (sDate)If (nDay = 1) or (nDay = 7) Then ‘It’s a

These two routines enable you to get the height of an item of a list box in terms of pixels, and they also enable you to set the height of

Creating an object that looks and acts like a collection is a good wayto implement a form of inheritance in VB4, where inheritance is not providedby the language. Creating properties

In many places, I include Error$ as picked up in an error trap in a descriptive message. I use a function to expand its meaning. I call the function TSS

Assume that you have the full path name of a file, and you need to beable to tell if the drive is writeable (that is, if it is a CD-ROM

While developing MDI applications in VB 4.0, you probably have noticed that the cursor on the MDI child disappears when you click on the toolbar on the MDI parent. You

Microsoft is currently working on a printing problem. Visual Basic 3.0 applications running in Windows 95 cannot print to shared printers with an embedded space. If a shared printer has