AddIn - ObjectDev. A Class Building Addin

This whole project began because of my utter loathing for Visual Basic’s Class Builder utility. I spent long amounts of time creating COM objects with repetitive coding. I also became interested in VB add-ins. I then decided to write my own Class Builder utility. I named it ObjectDev because it helps you develop objects. ObjectDev requires a knowledge of COM both to use it and to understand its code. I hope you find ObjectDev a useful and informative tool.

ObjectDev allows the user to specify any number of subs, functions, and properties. If Create Interface is selected, ObjectDev then generates an interface and an object which implements the interface. If Create Interface is not selected, then ObjectDev creates an object with no interface. If Persistable is selected, code is added to the ReadProperties and WriteProperties functions which enables persistence. If IsDirty is selected, a property let/get and a boolean is added to the objects. When a property is changed, the IsDirty boolean changes to True. ObjectDev will cut hours off the time required to create components for your program.

When I first began designing ObjectDev, I noticed that if you show another form, the variables on the original form do not hold their values. The best way around this problem was to create global variables to hold the information.

Since I wanted ObjectDev to be flexible, I decided to allow the prefixes on all variables to be changed. Since I allowed this changing, I needed something to hold the prefixes, and CPrefixes was born. CPrefixes is just a straightforward object that does nothing but hold data.

In order to store the properties created by the user, I wrote an object/collection. The properties/functions of CProperty are detailed below. The collection is self-explanatory.

• PropName - the name of the property

• ReturnType - enumeration of the type of the property (i.e. string, variant, etc.)

• Style - specifies if the property is Let/Get, Set/Get, Get (an object), or Get

• RetAsStr - returns a string with the ReturnType spelled out (i.e. “string”, “variant”, etc)

• VarName - returns the name of the property’s variable (i.e. ByVal sName as String) if you pass True, then either ByVal or ByRef is added on the front

• ByType - specifies if the property’s variable is passed ByRef or ByVal

In order to store the subs/functions created by the user, I wrote these objects. The properties/functions of CProperty are detailed below. The collection is self-explanatory.

• Arguments - holds the arguments collection for this sub/function (see the doc on CArgument and CArgumentCollection)

• IsPrivate - specifies if the sub/function is private or public

• RetAsStr - returns a string with the function return type spelled out (i.e. “string”,“variant”, etc.)

• ReturnType - an enum which specifies the function return type

• SubName -the name of the sub/function which will be written in code

In order to store the arguments of each subs/function created by the user, I wrote these objects. The properties/functions of CProperty are detailed below. The collection is self-explanatory.

• ArgName - the name of the argument which will be written to code

• ArgOptional - specifies if the argument is optional or not

• ArgType - the type of the argument (i.e. string, variant, etc.)

• ByType - specifies if the argument is passed ByVal or ByRef

• ByTypeAsString - returns “ByVal” or “ByRef” depending on what ByType is

• TypeAsString - returns a string with the argument type (i.e. FuncName As String, FuncName As Variant, etc.)