Microsoft Office applications can act as ActiveX Servers. They provide client applications design-time access to an Object library, or type library, that enables client applications to view an Office application's objects, properties, methods, and constants.

You can use late binding in a Visual Basic automation controller to automate an Office application without the need for referencing the Office application's type library. When you use late binding, you need to use the values for built-in constants for the Office application. This article describes how you can programmatically retrieve a list of built-in constants and the equivalent values at run time.

The following table illustrates which file contains the type library information:
Note The default location for these type libraries is: To determine information about a type library at run time, use the TypeLibInformation ActiveX object (tlbinf32.dll) that ships with Visual Studio 6.0. The following sample illustrates how you can use TypeLibInformation to retrieve a list of built-in constants from a type library.

Steps to create the sample program

1. Start Microsoft Visual Basic and create a new Standard EXE project. Form1 is created by default.
2. From the Project menu, select References, and set a reference to tlbinf32.dll by checking the box containing TypeLib information.
3. Place a CommandButton and two TextBoxes on the Visual Basic form.
4. Select the second TextBox named Text2 by default, and in the Properties window, set the Multiline property to True. Set the Scrollbar property of Text2 to 2-Vertical.
5. Copy the following code into the code window for Form1:

   Private Sub Command1_Click()
   Text1.Enabled = False
   Command1.Enabled = False
   Text2.Enabled = True
   GetWordConstants (Text1.Text)
   End Sub
   
   Private Sub GetWordConstants(strPath As String)
       Dim x As TypeLibInfo, sText as String
          
       On Error Resume Next
       'Get information from the Word Object library
       Set x = TypeLibInfoFromFile(Text1.Text)
       For Each r In x.Constants
           For Each mbr In r.Members
               sText = sText & mbr.Name & " = " & mbr.Value & vbCrLf
           Next mbr
       Next r
       Text2.Text = sText
       Set x = Nothing
       Text1.Enabled = True
       Command1.Enabled = True
   End Sub
   
   Private Sub Form_Load()
   Form1.WindowState = vbNormal
   Command1.Enabled = False
   Text1.Text = ""
   Text2.Text = ""
   Text2.Enabled = False
   End Sub
   
   Private Sub Text1_Change()
   If Text1.Text <> "" Then
   Command1.Enabled = True
   End If
   End Sub

6. Run the project. Type in the full path of an Office Object Library file in the first TextBox and click the CommandButton to display type library information in the second TextBox.

Note Tlbinf32.exe is a file that contains the HTML Help file for the TypeLibInformation object. The Tlbinf32.dll file and the HTML Help file are provided for your reference only, and they are not supported by Microsoft.

For more information about using the TypeLibInformation object, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: