CALLING VISUAL BASIC PROGRAMS

There are five methods for calling a Visual BASIC program that resides on the server from an HTML file.

Calling the Program From a Form

<FORM METHOD="POST" ACTION="/scripts/vb_bridge2/vb_bridge2.dll">
<INPUT TYPE="HIDDEN" NAME="VBEXE" SIZE=0 VALUE="c:\inetpub\scripts\vb_bridge2\helloworld.exe">
<INPUT TYPE="TEXT" NAME="STRING" SIZE=50 VALUE="Hello World">
<INPUT TYPE="SUBMIT" VALUE="Submit">
</FORM>

As shown in the preceding example, when calling a Visual BASIC program from a user input form, the vb_bridge.dll installed path and the path to Visual BASIC EXE file are defined within the form.

Calling the Program as an Image

<img src="/scripts/vb_bridge2/vb_bridge2.dll?VBEXE= c:\inetpub\scripts\vb_bridge2\counter.exe">

As shown above, Visual BASIC programs can also be called by using image tags.

Calling the Program Using Anchor Tags

<a href="/scripts/vb_bridge2/vb_bridge2.dll?VBEXE= c:\inetpub\scripts\vb_bridge2\search.exe&FNAME=TOM&LNAME=THOMAS">

When using anchor tags to call the Visual BASIC program, refer to the above example. In the case of this example, the fields that would be passed to the Visual BASIC program would be FNAME and LNAME, which are set as TOM and THOMAS respectively.

Calling the Program as a Frame

<FRAMESET cols="*,165" FRAMEBORDER="0" BORDERWIDTH="0" BORDER="0" NORESIZE FRAMESPACING=0>
<FRAME SRC="body.htm">
<FRAME SRC="/scripts/vb_bridge2/vb_bridge2.dll?VBEXE=c:\ inetpub\scripts\vb_bridge2\rightbanner.exe">
</FRAMESET>

When calling the Visual BASIC program into a frame, refer to the above example. In the case of this example, the rightbanner.exe is passing information into a frame on the right side of the browser.

Calling the Program through <META> Tags

<META HTTP-EQUIV="Refresh" CONTENT=0;URL="/scripts/vb_bridge2/vb_bridge2.dll? VBEXE=c:\inetpub\scripts\vb_bridge2\UserLog.exe">

The "Refresh" META above is being used an the index page. The META calls the UserLog.exe, which creates a log of the user access and sends to the browser HTML.