peter aitken

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Defining custom screen coordinates in VB6

Visual Basic 6 has several objects that contain a coordinate system, which you can use for positioning other objects within them. Find out why you may want to make changes to specific coordinates, and then learn how to do so. Several VB6 objects, specifically the Form, PictureBox, and Printer,...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Branding, Peter Aitken, Form1.Scale, coordinate system, left corner, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter

Technical articles 2005-05-05

Use VB6's TypeOf keyword to work with controls

Are you looking for a way to make a change to all the controls of a certain type on a VB6 form? Then find out why you should take advantage of the TypeOf keyword for these types of development tasks. There may be times when you want to do...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, TypeOf, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Control, Programming Languages, Corporate Communications, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development, Marketing

Technical articles 2006-01-26

Understand how to use VB6's UseMnemonic Property

If you don't want the VB6 Label control to treat ampersands in the usual manner, then learn how to use the control's UseMnemonic property to get the result you want. VB6's Label control lets you define an access key by including an ampersand (&) in the control's Caption...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, ampersand, UseMnemonic Property, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Control, Programming Languages, Corporate Communications, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development, Marketing

Technical articles 2006-01-19

Create a VB6 Command Button that fires repeatedly

There may be times when you want a VB6 Command Button to fire an event repeatedly, such as when you're performing an operation on multiple files. Learn how to create this kind of button in this VB tip. A Visual Basic 6 Command Button normally fires one event ...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Microsoft Visual Basic, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, Programming languages, Timer Control, Command Button, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2006-01-05

Display a select folder dialog box in VB6

VB6's Microsoft Shell and Automation Component allows you to select a folder. Follow Peter Aitken's instructions in this tip to learn how to show a particular folder's dialog box. VB6's Common Dialog control makes it easy to let the user select a file, but what about selecting a...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Folder, TechRepublic Inc., Declaration, Programming Languages, Corporate Communications, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development, Marketing

Technical articles 2005-12-15

Why you should be careful combining VB6 comparison operators

You may run into trouble when you include two or more VB6 comparisons in a conditional statement. Discover how you can avoid potential problems before they crop up. It's not uncommon to include two or more comparisons in a conditional statement like this: If X...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Microsoft Visual Basic, MyObj, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, Programming languages, MyObj.Count, Nothing AndMyObj.Count, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-12-08

Comparing Double vs. Single data types in VB6

VB6's two floating point types are called Single and Double. Learn what distinguishes Single from Double, and find out when you would be wise to use Double instead of Single in your programs. The data types Single and Double are VB6's two floating point types; they're used to...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, Programming languages, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Microsoft Visual Basic, Single, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-12-01

Displaying control-specific instructions in VB6 with GotFocus

The GotFocus event for a control fires in VB6 when the control receives the focus through user action or through the SetFocus method. See how you can use GotFocus to display information or instructions to the user. The GotFocus event for a control fires in VB6 when the...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, GotFocus, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Control, Telecom & Utilities, Programming Languages, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-11-04

Track time changes in VB6 with the SysInfo control

When developers look at log files, one of the most troubling things they can see is an unexplained time gap in the log record. Learn how SysInfo control's TimeChanged event can make your application keep close track of the time and eliminate those time gaps. Developers can use VB6's...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, SysInfo, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, SysInfo control, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Control, Programming Languages, Corporate Communications, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development, Marketing

Technical articles 2005-10-27

Automate data validation in VB6 with CausesValidation and Validate

Don't let invalid user data problems sneak up on you—prevent them by developing programs that take into account data validation. Find out how you can automate the data validation process in VB6 using the CausesValidation property and the Validate event procedure. Data validation is an important part of many...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Data Validation, Peter Aitken, CausesValidation, event procedure, TextBox, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Corporate Communications, Microsoft Development Tools, Programming Languages, Marketing, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-10-20

Normalizing spaces in VB6 strings

The term normalizing spaces refers to removing excess spaces in a string. If you're working with a text processing routine in VB6 that requires you to normalize spaces, check out this code sample and see how easy it is to accomplish this task. In VB6, the phrase "normalizing spaces"...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Space, Corporate Communications, Microsoft Development Tools, Programming Languages, Marketing, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-10-13

Learn about VB6's Currency data type

Visual Basic 6's Currency data type is specifically designed to hold data that represents money amounts. Discover several advantages to using the Currency data type. Many VB6 programmers automatically use the Single data type for holding data that represents money amounts. You should be aware that the ...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, data type, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Data, Currency, Microsoft Development Tools, Programming Languages, Corporate Communications, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development, Marketing

Technical articles 2005-09-29

Get the most out of Variants in VB6

VB6's Variant data type is able to hold any other data type, including numbers, strings, dates, and object references. Check out a couple of useful tricks for using Variants. Visual Basic 6's Variant data type is able to hold any other data type, including numbers, strings, dates, and...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Data, Value, Variant, Programming Languages, Corporate Communications, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development, Marketing

Technical articles 2005-09-15

Preserve procedure variables with Static in VB6

In order to make a Visual Basic procedure remember the value of local variables between calls, try using the Static keyword. Peter Aitken demonstrates the benefits of using Static. By default in Visual Basic, local variables—those declared inside a procedure—are re-initialized each time the procedure is called. Number...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, Function Foo, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Variable, Programming Languages, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-09-08

Define VB6 procedure arguments with the ParamArray keyword

In times when you don't know how many arguments will be passed to a procedure, you might want to think about using the ParamArray keyword. Learn how to use ParamArray in this VB6 tip. In some situations, you may not know ahead of time exactly how many arguments...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, ParamArray, Peter Aitken, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Argument, Corporate Communications, Microsoft Development Tools, Programming Languages, Marketing, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-09-01

How to omit or include optional arguments in VB6

There may be times when you may want to define one or more optional arguments that can be included or omitted when a procedure is called. Read this VB6 tip to learn how you can do so with the Optional keyword. Most VB6 procedures—subs and functions—take a fixed number...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, optional argument, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Argument, Programming Languages, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-08-25

Displaying file properties from within VB6

It can be a useful technique to find the properties of a file from within a VB6 program. Peter Aitken demonstrates how to do that in this quick tip. If you right-click a file name in Explorer and select Properties, Windows displays a dialog box with a variety...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, shInfo, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, TechRepublic Inc., Property, Microsoft Windows, Productivity, Corporate Communications, Operating Systems, Software, Marketing

Technical articles 2005-08-18

Determine if a credit card number is valid using VB6

If you support a Web site that accepts online payments, the first step in any process that accepts credit card numbers should be verifying the number. This tip shows how to do this using VB6. Credit card numbers are not assigned at random. Each number, usually 16 digits...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Peter Aitken, Sales channel, Financial services, credit card, credit card number, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Sales

Technical articles 2005-08-11

Enumerate your CD-ROM drives

If you are writing a Visual Basic program that makes use of the CD drive, it is usually a good idea to check to see what is actually available. This Visual Basic tip shows you how to get a list of the CD-ROM drives on your system. Most of...

Tags: CD, CD-ROM, Peter Aitken, Consumer electronics, CD-ROM drive, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Microsoft Visual Basic, Personal Technology

Technical articles 2005-08-04

Simplify programming with enumerations in VB6

VB6 lets you create enumerations, which are programmer-defined data types that can take on a set of constant values. Peter Aitken shows you how to create and use enumerations. VB6 lets you create enumerations, which are programmer-defined data types that can take on a set of...

Tags: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Microsoft Visual Basic, Peter Aitken, Microsoft development tools, programming, enumeration, Visual Basic Tips Newsletter, Value, Programming Languages, Development Tools, Software Development, Software/Web Development

Technical articles 2005-08-02