New Win10 development machine, VB6 IDE "mostly" going fine, but...

[Elroy]

Hi All,

Well, I finally broke down and bought a new development machine this weekend, with the latest Win10 of course.

With a thorough review of my notes, and some liberal use of the metaphorical sledge hammer, the VB6 IDE is pretty much up and running.

Just as an FYI for others, the "tricks" I've found are:

• Place a zero-byte MSJAVA.DLL in the C:\Windows folder.
• When installing, don't install the ADO stuff, even though the installer issues a warning about it.
• Definitely install VB6 SP6 (and I also installed a couple of other KB releases).
• Set compatibility to Windows Vista SP2 on the VB6.EXE.
• As a further FYI, the mscomctl.ocx and mscomct2.ocx seem to be working just fine.

But I do have one problem. I've lost my selection box. Here it is on my old Win7 computer:



And then, when I finish dragging the box over the controls, I don't get my selection handles. Here those are on my Win7 computer:



What's interesting is that they are actually selected on the new Win10 computer. I just can't see what I'm selecting, and I can't see what I've selected when I'm done.

Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks,
Elroy

[Thierry69]

I have exactly the same issue. I had no time to try to find some way to fix it.

[dilettante]

Place a zero-byte MSJAVA.DLL in the C:\Windows folder.

Not needed, just ok the dialog and continue. I have never needed this to keep the elephants away.


You are applying way more shims than you need or want to.

There are only three you want:



And many people can skip HighDpiAware for that matter.

VirtualizeDesktopPainting is needed but you do lose the grab handles when you multiselect in the design views. I never found a fix for that.

[Elroy]

Ahhh, thanks dilettante. I'll play around with the shims more when I get a chance.

Also, I found my problem with the selection rectangle (or, should I say, Win10's problem). I've got multiple monitors, which I virtually always do. If I don't make the most-left-hand monitor my "main display" (under Display Settings), Windows (or VB6) gets confused about where to put the selection rectangle.

I discovered this when I "saw" the selection rectangle WAY off to the left in the totally wrong place. That's not a terribly bad fix, and I can live with it.

The multi-select "show what's selected" handles, that's another problem. It's going to be distressing if I lose those, as I have some relatively complex forms that I occasionally make changes to, like today.

Anyone else seen this? And maybe have the fix?

Best Regards,
Elroy

[Elroy]

And crud! My Joe Bott scroll wheel fix is no longer working. Say Dilettante, what are you using to fix this?

[dilettante]

I've had trouble with scroll wheel add-ins.

Now I just install X-Mouse Button Control and set up a profile for VB6 with "Scroll Method: Method 1" and call it good.

No real pain for me, because I needed a hack anyway. I have a Microsoft Mouse that doesn't have a decent driver on Windows 10 (I need to remap Mouse Button 5 as 'Back") so I needed some sort of mouse helper anyway.

[Elroy]

Hmm, ok, I tried X-Mouse but couldn't get it working for the life of me. Tried both 32 and 64 bit versions, but no cigar. I finally got tired of playing with settings and reloading VB6, and started looking for things I'd done in the past.

Finally, I found FreeWheel. I lost my scrolling in the top-half on split-code-windows, but everything else seems to work, so I'll take it.

I'm still worried about losing my little interior-handles when I've done a multi-control-selection. It'd sure be nice to get those back somehow.

If anyone has any ideas, it'd be much appreciated.

[Elroy]

Well crud. Nothing in any other forums I can find about the multi-select handles. I also thought about an add-in, but there doesn't seem to be anything in the extensibility model about whether or not a control is selected.

I suppose I could consider an external program that monitors any open form in the VB6 IDE, but that wouldn't cover windowless controls. And, in any event, I suspect the selection list is internal to the VB6 IDE, and not available to any windows API calls.

Hmmm, I guess I'll have to learn how to do form design with shades on. This just feels like Microsoft giving VB6 little cuts, still trying to see if they can kill it off.

[LaVolpe]

FYI: The MouseWheelFix add-in works for me in Win10

I don't use the compatibility. Rather I use external manifest and declare VB as Win10 compatible (or whatever system I happen to be running). I also declare it DPIaware & include common controls v6. However, I do use the "Run this program as an administrator" in the compatibility tab. Even skipping the ACT (I think that's what dilettante's screenshot is), I lose grab handles when multiselecting also.

[Karl77]

VirtualizeDesktopPainting is needed

Does this remove the lag when moving or sizing controls?

Karl

[dilettante]

Is there a lag anymore? I don't see any, but maybe there was before using VirtualizeDesktopPainting. Things are much different now in the post-Aero world.

[Karl77]

Is there a lag anymore? I don't see any, but maybe there was before using VirtualizeDesktopPainting. Things are much different now in the post-Aero world.

I tried VirtualizeDesktopPainting.
The effect is worse than without.
Now when moving/sizing a control with the mouse in the IDE, it becomes invisible until mouseup.
Better with flicker than invisibility.

[Elroy]

FYI: The MouseWheelFix add-in works for me in Win10

I don't use the compatibility. Rather I use external manifest and declare VB as Win10 compatible (or whatever system I happen to be running). I also declare it DPIaware & include common controls v6. However, I do use the "Run this program as an administrator" in the compatibility tab. Even skipping the ACT (I think that's what dilettante's screenshot is), I lose grab handles when multiselecting also.

Say LaVolpe,

Would you be amenable to sharing the manifest file you use with the VB6.exe program? I've got things pretty much running (except for the multi-select handles), but I still wouldn't mind taking a look at what you're doing.

All The Best,
Elroy

[dilettante]

Well soon we'll start seeing reports of new changes. Win 10 version 1703 (Redstone 2, a.k.a. "Creators Update") is being pushed out gradually now.

[Elroy]

A BIG thanks to Dilettante for the X-mouse tip. This is the ONLY one I could get to work with VB6 and the latest Microsoft mouse drivers.