VSDraw Control

The VSDraw control lets you create detailed, scaleable, resolution-independent drawings. The drawings can be shown on your forms, printed, save to disk or copied to the Windows clipboard, where they become available for pasting into other Windows applications such as Microsoft Word.

The coordinate system used to create and display the drawing is determined by the programmer using the ScaleWidth, ScaleHeight, ScaleLeft, and ScaleTop properties (similar to the VB's PictureBox control). These properties may be modified after the drawing has been created, and the changes will be reflected on the display.

The scaling is used for all drawing and measurements, including font height. For example, if the ScaleHeight property is set to 1000 and the FontSize property is set to 100, then the font height corresponds to 1/10th of the control height.

After the drawing is created, you can change the drawing extents to provide distortion and zoom. Use the VSDraw control to create custom maps, charts, diagrams or whatever graphics you need.

The VSDraw control is based on Windows metafile technology, which has limited support for text manipulation. This makes it less than ideal for text-intensive applications. If you need to handle a lot of text, use the VSPrinter control instead.

Note: Before you can use a VSDraw control in your application, you must add the VSDraw8.ocx file to your project. Please refer to the VB documentation for details on adding controls to your projects.

To distribute applications you create with the VSDraw control, you must install and register it on the user's computer. The Setup Wizard provided with Visual Basic provides tools to help you do that. Please refer to the Visual Basic manual for details.

The VSDraw control provides the following properties, events and methods:

All of the properties, events and methods for the VSDraw control are listed in the following tables. Properties, events and methods that apply only to this control, or that require special consideration when used with it, are marked with an asterisk (*). These are documented in later sections. For documentation on the remaining properties, see the Visual Basic documentation.

Properties

*AccessibleDescription	Gets or sets the description of the control used by accessibility client applications.
*AccessibleName	Gets or sets the name of the control used by accessibility client applications.
*AccessibleRole	Gets or sets the role of the control used by accessibility client applications.
*AccessibleValue	Gets or sets the value of the control used by accessibility client applications.
*Action	Executes actions such as clear, show, and print.
Appearance	See the Visual Basic documentation.
BackColor	See the Visual Basic documentation.
*BackStyle	Returns or sets whether text is transparent or opaque.
BorderStyle	See the Visual Basic documentation.
*BrushColor	Returns or sets the brush color.
*BrushStyle	Returns or sets the brush style.
*Draw	Draws an object within the rectangle defined by the X1, Y1, X2, and Y2 properties.
*EmptyColor	Returns or sets the color of the area around the preview page.
Enabled	See the Visual Basic documentation.
Font	See the Visual Basic documentation.
hWnd	See the Visual Basic documentation.
*KeepTextAspect	Returns or sets whether text should keep its aspect ratio when the drawing is resized.
*LargeChangeHorz	Returns or sets the amount of change to the ScrollLeft property when the user clicks the scroll bar area.
*LargeChangeVert	Returns or sets the amount of change to the ScrollTop property when the user clicks the scroll bar area.
*LineSpacing	Returns or sets the line spacing as a percentage (for example, 100% is single spacing, 200% is double spacing).
MouseIcon	See the Visual Basic documentation.
MousePointer	See the Visual Basic documentation.
*MouseScroll	Returns or sets whether contents may be scrolled by dragging the VSDraw's client area.
*PageHeight	Returns or sets the physical height of the drawing, in twips.
*PageWidth	Returns or sets the physical width of the drawing, in twips.
*PenColor	Returns or sets the pen color.
*PenStyle	Returns or sets the pen style.
*PenWidth	Returns or sets the pen width, in logical units.
*Picture	Returns a snapshot of the current drawing.
*Polygon	Draws a polygon defined by a string of X,Y coordinates.
*Polyline	Draws a line defined by a string of X,Y coordinates.
*ProportionalBars	Returns or sets whether the scrollbar thumbs should be proportional to the size of the visible area.
*ScaleHeight	Returns or sets the number of logical units for the vertical dimension of the drawing.
*ScaleLeft	Returns or sets the horizontal coordinate for the left edge of the drawing.
*ScaleTop	Returns or sets the vertical coordinate for the top edge of the drawing.
*ScaleWidth	Returns or sets the number of logical units for the horizontal dimension of the drawing.
*ScrollLeft	Returns or sets the left coordinate of the visible area, in twips.
*ScrollTop	Returns or sets the top coordinate of the visible area, in twips.
*SmallChangeHorz	Returns or sets the amount of change to the ScrollLeft property when the user clicks the scroll arrow.
*SmallChangeVert	Returns or sets the amount of change to the ScrollTop property when the user clicks the scroll arrow.
*Text	Prints a string starting at the point defined by the X1, Y1 properties.
*TextAlign	Returns or sets the text alignment.
*TextAngle	Returns or sets the text angle, in tenths of degrees.
*TextColor	Returns or sets the text color.
*TextHeight	Returns the height of a string in scale units.
*TextWidth	Returns the width of a string in scale units.
*Track	Returns or sets whether scrolling occurs as the user drags the scroll thumb.
*Version	Returns the version of the control currently loaded.
*X1	Returns or sets the left coordinate of the rectangle used with the Draw property.
*X2	Returns or sets the right coordinate of the rectangle used with the Draw property.
*Y1	Returns or sets the top coordinate of the rectangle used with the Draw property.
*Y2	Returns or sets the bottom coordinate of the rectangle used with the Draw property.
*Zoom	Returns or sets the preview scale: set to a percentage, or zero to fill the control.
*ZoomMode	Sets or returns the zoom mode (explicit percentage or one of the automatic settings).

Methods

*Clear	Resets the control and discards its contents.
*ClientToPage	Converts mouse coordinates to page coordinates.
*Copy	Updates the drawing and copies it to the clipboard.
*DrawCircle	Draws a circle, circular wedge, or circular arc.
*DrawEllipse	Draws an ellipse, wedge, or arc.
*DrawLine	Draws a line segment.
*DrawPicture	Draws a bitmap or an icon.
*DrawRectangle	Draws a rectangle.
*LoadDoc	Loads a VSDraw document (metafile) from disk.
*PageToClient	Converts page coordinates to mouse coordinates.
*PrintDoc	Updates the drawing and copies it to the printer.
*Refresh	See the Visual Basic documentation.
*SaveDoc	Saves a VSDraw document (metafile) to disk.
*SetPageExtent	Sets the PageWidth and PageHeight properties.
*Show	Updates the drawing and shows it on the screen.

Events

Click	See the Visual Basic documentation.
DblClick	See the Visual Basic documentation.
KeyDown	See the Visual Basic documentation.
KeyPress	See the Visual Basic documentation.
KeyUp	See the Visual Basic documentation.
MouseDown	See the Visual Basic documentation.
MouseMove	See the Visual Basic documentation.
MouseUp	See the Visual Basic documentation.
*Scroll	Fired after the control scrolls its contents.