How do I NAVIGATE an external Internet Explorer_Server class??

[rfaricy]

I am in need of help here ... I have an application that needs to read information from an existing web browser window (located within an application I did not create). I am able to read the text from it using the IEDom tutorial seen everywhere ...

... but now what I need it to do is to actually navigate to a different page.

I have attempted to create an object within my application that points to the Internet Explorer_Server class' IWebBrowser2, almost identically to the routine that gets the IHTMLDocument class so that I can read my text.

The only problem is, when it gets to "If hr Then Throw New COMException(hr)", it (obviously) throws an exception. Everything else seems to be working great.

I know the function shouldn't return an "Object" but rather a WebBrowser. Right? I just happened to have forgotten to change it back before I pasted it here.

What am I doing wrong? How can I subclass another applications "Internet Explorer_Server" in order to tell it to go to a certain URI?

Public Module IEBrowser
Declare Function ObjectFromLresult Lib "oleacc" (ByVal lResult As Int32, ByRef riid As System.Guid, ByVal wParam As Int32, ByRef ppvObject As IHTMLDocument) As Int32
Dim win32 As New Win32Functions()

Public Function IEBrowserFromhWnd(ByVal hWnd As IntPtr) As Object
Dim IID_IWebBrowser2 As System.Guid = New System.Guid("D30C1661-CDAF-11D0-8A3E-00C04FC9E26E")
'Dim hWndChild As Int32
Dim lRes As Int32
Dim lMsg As Int32
Dim hr As Int32
If Not hWnd.Equals(0) Then
If Not hWnd.Equals(0) Then
' Register the message
lMsg = MDC.Win32Functions.RegisterWindowMessage("WM_HTML_GETOBJECT")
'MsgBox(lMsg.ToString)
' Get the object
Call MDC.Win32Functions.SendMessageTimeout(hWnd, lMsg, 0, 0, MDC.Win32Functions.SMTO_ABORTIFHUNG, 1000, lRes)

If lRes Then
' Get the object from lRes
hr = ObjectFromLresult(lRes, IID_IWebBrowser2, 0, IEBrowserFromhWnd)
If hr Then Throw New COMException(hr)
End If
End If
Else
MsgBox("bad hwnd!!")
End If
End Function
End Module

[rfaricy]

Okay, I've switched to IHTMLDocument2 and it has the Navigate method. But when I go pass it a URL, it doesn't do anything.

Help?

[anotherVBnewbie]

The attached project should give you everything you need. Note that it will also provide access to Windows Explorer windows as well as IE windows unless you check the window class before adding the window to the collection.

[iPrank]

Great code anotherVBnewbie !
It very nicely controls an external IE window.

However, rfaricy's original question was,

I have an application that needs to read information from an existing web browser window (located within an application I did not create).

I guess he is talking about Webbrowser Controls embedded in another application (like Yahoo Messanger PM window). I'm very interested in this topic too. I have searched Google a lot but didn't find anything usefull.

Could you please give any idea how to navigate an external webbrowser control ?