Copyright: Copyright © 1966, Mathew W. Gower


Control Toolkit

Control Toolkit is a 16-bit add-in for Visual Basic (version 4.x). The add-in makes a toolbar available within the development environment for assisting with managing controls placed on forms. Many of the actions available from the toolbar would tediously require multiple steps or switching between a form and the Properties window, so using Control Toolkit, a developer can spend less time changing properties (and more time working on the fun part of a project - coding!)

Control Toolkit is Copyright © 1996, Mathew W. Gower

Control Toolkit is distributed as a $15.00 shareware add-in for VB. If you like and use it, please pay for it. There aren't any weird registration schemes, time delayed functionality limits, nag screens, etc. I figure that the only people using this will be developers, and of all computer users, the development community would have a greater sense of responsibility in paying for the programs they use (who better to recognize the effort involved in creating a program?). You only need to pay once, in the case of future additions, updates, etc. Please send shareware payments to:

Mathew W. Gower

P.O. Box 824

Ridgely, MD 21660

Any questions, comments, or bug reports can be sent to me e-mail at mgower@access.digex.net.

Control Toolkit Toolbar (click on a tool for help)

Further Information...

Loading and unloading the Control Toolkit add-in

How the Control Toolkit menu item works

Typical Software Disclaimer...

If this program in any way makes life miserable for you (toasts your hard disk, eats your projects, makes Windows even more unstable, etc.), I (Mathew W. Gower) can in no way, shape, or form be held responsible. You decide to try or use it, you accept full responsiblity for adverse side effects.


About Control Toolkit

Change the Control Toolkit toolbar to display the current version and a copyright notice. The information is only displayed while the button is held down.


Align Left

Align the left edge of all selected controls. All will aligned to the control which is closest to the left edge of the form.


Select Control in Tab List

Click on a control in this list to change it's Tab Order.


Align Right

Align the right edge of all selected controls. All will aligned to the control which is closest to the right edge of the form.


Align Tops

Align the top edge of all selected controls. All will aligned to the control which is closest to the top edge of the form.


Align Bottoms

Align the bottom edge of all selected controls. All will aligned to the control which is closest to the bottom edge of the form.


Align Horizontal Centers

Selected controls will be aligned along their horizontal centers. The horizontal centerline is the based on the highest and lowest selected controls.


Align Vertical Centers

Selected controls will be aligned along their vertical centers. The vertical centerline is the based on the selected controls farthest to the left and right.


Space Evenly Horizontally

Evenly space selected controls horizontally at a specified distance as entered on the Control Toolkit toolbar.


Space Evenly Vertically

Evenly space selected controls vertically at a specified distance as entered on the Control Toolkit toolbar.


Even Spacing Units

Enter the number of units to be placed between controls when spacing horizontally or vertically. This number is in units as specified in the container's Scale (twips, pixels, etc.).


Set Tab Order

Set the Tab Order of all controls on the active form which have a TabIndex property, and have their TabStop property set to True.

See Control Tab Order...


Copy Width and Height

Copy the Width and Height properties of the currently selected control. Note that if more than one control is currently selected, nothing will be copied.


Paste Width and Height

Paste Width and Height properties previously copied from a control to all controls currently selected.


Show Toolbox

Display or bring to the top of all windows the Visual Basic Toolbox. (This scans the Master Tasklist for the first instance of Visual Basic, activates it, then uses SendKeys to display the Toolbox. What actually happens may not be what you'd expect if you have multiple copies of Visual Basic run, such as when testing OLE servers, since the first instance encountered may be the one in the background.)


Control Tab Order

Here you can visually set the tab order of all controls in a form. Controls will only be displayed if they have a TabIndex property, and their TabStop property is set to True.

Change Control Tabs Form (click on an item for help)


Move Up in Tab Order

Click to move the selected control up (earlier) in the Tab Order.


Move Down in Tab Order

Click to move the selected control down (later) in the Tab Order.


Cancel Tab Order Changes

Ignores all changes made to the Tab Order of controls, and hides this form.


Save Tab Order Changes

Save all changes made to the Tab Order of the controls in the list, then hides this form.


Loading and unloading the Control Toolkit add-in

To make the Control Toolkit available for selection from within Visual Basic, you must first run the actual executable (ctltk16.exe). Do this by double clicking in the Explorer/File Manager, selecting 'Run' from the Start Menu/Program Manager File Menu, etc. This registers the add-in with both Windows and Visual Basic.

Control Toolkit will automatically close when Visual Basic is exited. There is a delay before this happens though. (VB releases references to OLE servers when it quits, Windows closes down OLE server, etc.)


How the Control Toolkit menu item works

When the Control Toolkit is first added to Visual Basic, or when it is already added and Visual Basic is first run, the Control Toolkit toolbar is automatically displayed. Its current position is saved when you quit Visual Basic, so if it has already been added to Visual Basic, it will appear in it's last position.

A menu item for the Control Toolkit is added to the Visual Basic Add-Ins menu, and when the Control Toolkit toolbar is first displayed, this menu item is checked. Selecting the menu item will uncheck it, and hide the toolbar. (and vice versa...)