Links:
SuperEdi Downloads
WoLoSoft International
Required:
SuperEdi
VB6 Runtime Files
Download:
Auto C 3.5.3
(approx. 800
KB)
Recommended:
ActiveX Control Pad
Compilers:
Borland C/C++
Compiler
LCC-Win32 Compiler
Pelles C for Windows
Open Watcom C/C++
Additional:
Version History
Copyright © 2010
by Wade Schuette
wadeschu@gmail.com
Updated August 16, 2010 |
|
Auto C - 3.5.3 - August 16, 2010
Auto C is a way to create Windows
applications in C visually. Drawing controls on a form using a mouse is all
you need to do to create a working Windows program in C. Use a toolbox,
properties box and property pages to design and edit your program's user
interface. Use the same sort of WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) design
environment that the classic Visual Basic IDE provides.
Use of the following controls is supported:
Check Box
Combo Box
Command Button
Frame (group box)
Label
List Box
Option Button
Picture Box
Progress Bar
Scrollbar
Slider
Tab Strip
Text Box
Toolbar
Up-Down Button
Minimum Requirements:
VB6 Runtime Files
WoLoSoft International's SuperEdi
Recommended:
Microsoft ActiveX Control Pad
Borland C/C++ Compiler 5.5
LCC-Win32 Compiler
Pelles C For Windows
Open Watcom C/C++
Microsoft MSDN Library (version 6 or later)
Additional help files are also recommended. See Auto C's help file for more
information.
Setting up Auto C on your computer involves
obtaining and installing various free programs from different sources. All are
free to use indefinitely. If you have SuperEdi
installed then you can run Auto C to get an idea of what it
does. Then, you can download and install more components if you wish to.
Microsoft ActiveX Control Pad is integral to Auto C's operation.
However, you can run Auto C without it and install it at a later time.
You should install at least one supported compiler if you haven't already
done so. If you don't have
the MSDN Library then you should download the recommended help files. See Auto C's
help file for more information.
Auto C has great built-in support for using bitmap and
icon resources. Also, using custom colors for many controls is supported.
These features help make your user interfaces colorful and attractive.
Auto C can be used to make Windows GUI mode
Applications and Dynamic Link Libraries only. Auto C projects are of one
specific form. A project will contain a C source code file and header file
that are completely auto-generated.
However, the benefit is that Auto C is very
practical. So many other IDE's leave you wondering how to actually make a
Windows program with it. This is not the case with Auto C. With Auto C you can
simply point and click to make Windows executables of moderate complexity.
There is no script or language that you have to
learn in order to use Auto C. You work with platform SDK C. Auto C doesn't
create dialog box RC scripts.
One way to use Auto C is to use it as a project
file generator. You can then use the files it creates in the IDE of your
choice. You can even use the files in another IDE and then come back and
reopen a project in Auto C so that the project's user interface can be
re-edited.
About the MS Forms 2.0 Form Layout Designer
Auto C makes use of the MS Forms 2.0 form layout
designer. Although the MS Forms 2.0 form layout designer has been around for a
long time, it can still be found in applications such as Microsoft Office XP 2002 and Microsoft
Office 2003, and other newer products. To see this, run Word or FrontPage and press Alt & F11 to start the
Visual Basic Editor (you might need the Office setup disk). Then use the Insert menu to insert a UserForm. This will
demonstrate that the same form layout designer that ActiveX Control Pad uses
(contained in Fm20.dll) is still used with modern Microsoft products.
You can access the Visual Basic Editor under
Microsoft Word using automation. However, you must first explicitly allow
macros access to Visual Basic projects. To do this, run Microsoft Word. Under the Tools menu
there will be a Macro sub-menu. Select Security from the Macro sub-menu
and the Security dialog box will appear. On the Trusted Sources tab, check
the check box that says "Trust access to Visual Basic Project" and click
OK.
After allowing external access to Word VB
projects you can try the following VBScript. It creates an instance of
the VB editor and makes it visible, adds a form and then adds a label to the
form:
'VBScript example of
creating an instance of the VB Editor under Microsoft Word using automation.
'Requires that Word's Macro Security settings allow external access to Visual
Basic Projects.
Const vbext_ct_MSForm = 3
On Error Resume Next
Set WordApp = CreateObject("Word.Application.8")
If Err.Number = 0
Then
WordApp.Visible = True
WordApp.ShowVisualBasicEditor = True
Set VBComps =
WordApp.VBE.ActiveVBProject.VBComponents
If Err.Number
= 0 Then
For Each
Object1 In VBComps
VBComps.Remove
Object1
Next
Set Form1 =
VBComps.Add(vbext_ct_MSForm)
Set Label1 =
Form1.Designer.Controls.Add("Forms.Label.1")
Label1.Caption =
"Hello, World!"
Label1.FontBold = True
Label1.AutoSize = True
Label1.Left
= Form1.Designer.insidewidth / 2 - Label1.Width / 2
Label1.Top =
Form1.Designer.insideheight / 2 - Label1.Height / 2
If MsgBox ("Click
OK to close and quit, or Cancel to quit without closing.", _
vbOkCancel,
"Closing") = vbOK Then WordApp.Quit
Else
MsgBox "Visual
Basic Editor could not be accessed." + VbCrLf + VbCrLf + _
"Make sure that the Visual Basic Editor is installed,
and that " + _
"macro security settings trust programmatic access to VB
Projects.", _
vbOKOnly, Err.Description
WordApp.Quit
End If
Else
MsgBox
"Word Object could not be created.", vbOKOnly,
Err.Description
End If
After Fm20.dll is registered on your system the
MS Forms 2.0 designer can also be used under Visual Basic 5 or 6. To try this
run VB, right-click the Toolbox and select "Components...". The Components
dialog box will appear. Click the "Designers" tab and make sure that Microsoft
Forms 2.0 is checked and click OK. Use the Project menu to add an MS Forms
2.0 form to the project.
An instance of the MS Forms 2.0 form layout
designer can't be created using just the Fm20.dll. Here is what Microsoft says
about using Fm20.dll:
"The Fm20.dll is not redistributable. You
must have an application such as Microsoft Office ... on the target system that
installs Fm20.dll as part of its setup."
"As an alternative to having your end users
install Microsoft Office, you can have them freely download and install the
Microsoft ActiveX Control Pad, which also installs the Fm20.dll."
-from the MSDN Library - April 2003 edition:
Office Solutions Development\Microsoft Office\Knowledge Base\Office
Developer\INFO: Usage and Redistribution of FM20.DLL
About Microsoft ActiveX Control
Pad
ActiveX Control Pad is a free program from
Microsoft that uses the MS Forms 2.0 form layout designer. Theoretically Auto C could have been designed to use one of the
commercial Microsoft applications described above. However, users would have to
own Microsoft Office or Visual Basic in order to use Auto C. ActiveX Control Pad
is used so that all users can use Auto C.
When ActiveX Control Pad is run
under Auto C everything except the MS Forms 2.0 form layout designer is disabled
or suppressed. The fact that it uses older forms of html and vbscript
is irrelevant as far as Auto C is concerned. Only ActiveX/Automation/OLE and API
functions are used to create C source code from the form being edited. Auto C doesn't read
from those older style object tags. Auto C provides a replacement toolbox, which
means that ActiveX Control Pad will run
without error under all versions of Windows.
ActiveX Control Pad is described by Microsoft as
being a Beta Release, For Developers. This is a very accurate description. It is
not the sort of program that a non-developer would use. It is recommended that you only use it with Auto C and that you manually remove the
Start Menu shortcuts it creates when it is installed.
If you have version 6 of the MSDN Library (the
version that comes with Microsoft Visual Studio 6 products) then you already have
Microsoft ActiveX
Control Pad. Refer to Auto C's help file for more information about installing
ActiveX Control Pad from the MSDN Library 6 CD, and for information about using
the MSDN Library for keyword help in SuperEdi.
Auto C Version History
Version 3.5.3 - August 16, 2010
- The way in which fonts are created has
been simplified, and default values are now used for most of the arguments
to CreateFont(). Previously, non-default arguments were used for some
fonts.
- The navigation pane in the help file is
no longer hidden when focus is lost.
- Minor revisions have been made to the
example files to more closely match how Windows shows and hides access
keys as the Alt key is pressed.
Version 3.5.2 - July 28, 2010
- If you created a new DLL project and
specified the name of an existing file, no message box was displayed to
confirm the file overwrite.
- Files opened with Auto C are now kept off
of the recent documents menu.
- Improvements have been made to the VB
form example file that is included with Auto C (In the DLL Source
sub-folder of the Run-time Link Dll Example folder). It is an example of
using the RunTimeDemo dll under VB6, and it also contains complete
information on using it under VB.NET.
- When looking for the Borland compiler,
the default location of
C:\BORLAND\BCC55\ is checked again. With the last couple of versions
of Auto C that location wasn't checked.
Version 3.5.1 - July 15, 2010
- When browsing for files using the Picture
Property Page, all file types were initially displayed in the File Open
dialog box. Now, a filter is properly applied and only bitmap, icon and
cursor files are shown. This was only a problem with version 3.5 and no
prior versions.
- The way in which Auto C reads what a
program writes to StdOut and StdErr has been improved. Previously, doing
anything more than writing short strings could cause Auto C to crash.
There was a practical limit of 255 characters, and this was not
documented. Now there is no limit on string length and reading strings
from StdOut and StdErr should be more stable.
- The file search utility GREP is no longer
distributed with Auto C. Searching of file contents is now done directly
in code. GREP would not return multi-line macro definitions. Entire
multi-line macros should be displayed, although searches may take slightly longer.
- Prior versions of Auto C contained
troubleshooting information concerning a problem with Open Watcom 1.8, and
an Auto C example files contained a workaround for that problem. Because
an updated version of Open Watcom is now available, the troubleshooting
information and workaround have been removed. Please upgrade to Open Watcom version 1.9.
Version 3.5 - July 9, 2010
- If a DLL project was open, an error would
occur when changing the dll's name or when adding/removing dll project
files.
- When a form was opened for editing, a
control's font size wasn't always set correctly, depending on the font and
size.
- Scrollbars now have a PageSize property.
Change the PageSize to change the size of a scrollbar's Scroll Box.
- COMDLG32.OCX is no longer distributed
with Auto C. File open and save operations are now done directly in code.
Version 3.4.9 - May 25, 2010
- Version 3.4.8 had one minor regression:
Compiler output was written to SuperEdi's console twice instead of just
once.
Version 3.4.8 - May 16, 2010
- If a program launched by using Auto C's
custom command didn't end by itself, clicking "Stop" didn't always end all
processes cleanly, and sometimes Auto C would freeze. This problem should
be fixed, clicking the stop button should now properly end the process.
Version 3.4.7 - April 25, 2010
- If all controls were removed from a form,
HWND declarations for those controls were not always removed. This problem
has been fixed.
Version 3.4.6 - April 23, 2010
- With versions 3.4.1 to 3.4.5 the Add
Declarations command didn't work correctly. Variable declarations for
exported dll functions weren't added to a project's main file, only to the
auto-generated file. This problem has been fixed.
- The Recommended Help Files topic has been
removed from the help file.
- When manually specifying the Borland
compiler's location, a Browse For Folder dialog box is now displayed
instead of a File Open dialog box.
Version 3.4.5 - March 25, 2010
- If a web page is open in SuperEdi's Web
Browser, that page is now reloaded when a different project is opened.
- Auto C's application manifest has been
moved back into Auto C.exe as the only resource. Previously, it was a
separate file.
Version 3.4.4 - March 5, 2010
- If Auto C is near the right or bottom
edge of the screen when the screen resolution is decreased, Auto C will
now bring itself back onto the screen.
- A link has been added to Auto C's help
file for the Windows 7 version of the Microsoft update required to view
Windows Help (*.hlp) files.
- When ActiveX Control Pad is run under
Auto C the Properties Box is now displayed automatically.
Version 3.4.3 - February 15, 2010
- With the last two versions of Auto C, the
menu icon was
not correctly displayed in ActiveX Control Pad as intended.
- With version 3.4.2, some files were not
removed when uninstalling.
Version 3.4.2 - February 13, 2010
- Auto C now makes backup copies of project
files.
- A minor change to the Play Sound example was made
to make it perform better under Windows Vista and later.
Version 3.4.1 - January 9, 2010
- When adding a resource script file to a
DLL project, you couldn't use a file with the same title as an existing
DLL project file. For example, if a file named File1.c was part of a DLL
project then you couldn't add a file named File1.rc. This restriction no
longer exists.
- All of Auto C's resources have been moved
to AUTOC.DLL. Previously, some resources were in Auto C.exe and some were
in AUTOC.OCX.
- Links in the help file are now opened
within the help viewer. Previously, clicking some links in the help file
were displayed in the default web browser.
Version 3.4 - July 23, 2009
- If SuperEdi was minimized when a form or
menu was opened for editing then ActiveX Control Pad wasn't displayed
correctly.
Version 3.3.9 - July 15, 2009
- When editing menus, applying changes is
now much faster.
Version 3.3.8 - July 3, 2009
- The length of some binary Boolean values
that Auto C wrote to the registry were longer than they needed to be,
sometimes as many as four bytes. Although this did not cause any errors,
the length of the values have been
reduced.
- Invalid variable names for font handles
were created when font names contained any characters other than letters,
numerals or spaces. This problem has been fixed.
- If you changed a Scrollbar's backcolor
from the default, and no other control color had been changed from the
default, then the scrollbar's backcolor was not changed. This problem has
been fixed.
- The default backcolor for Scrollbars has
been changed from COLOR_BTNFACE to COLOR_WINDOW.
- The option of having a form display a
What's This Help button has been added.
Version 3.3.7 - June 18, 2009
- When the Windows Styles dialog box was
used to add a cursor or icon to a project an excessively long resource
name was generated. This problem has been fixed.
- Selecting "MainWindowProc" from the
Functions menu didn't work. This problem has been fixed.
Version 3.3.6 - June 9, 2009
- If a function had a somewhat long
arguments list then it didn't appear in Auto C's functions menu. This
problem has been fixed.
Version 3.3.5 - June 6, 2009
- Under 64-bit Windows, Auto C only worked
with 32-bit versions of SuperEdi. Now you can use a 64-bit version of
SuperEdi.
- Under 64-bit Windows, 64-bit Pelles C did
not work with Auto C. Now you can use either 32-bit or 64-bit Pelles C
with Auto C.
- Previously, a call to
InitCommonControlsEx() appeared in the auto-generated source code only if
common controls were actually used. Now, a call to InitCommonControls()
will always appear no matter what types of controls are used. This
corrects a problem that existed on some Windows XP machines when using
Windows XP visual styles.
- When using Auto C's functions menu with a
Dll file that contained only a DllMain function, an extra menu item
appeared. The unneeded menu item has now been removed.
Version 3.3.4 - May 14, 2009
- When editing a form or menu, making the
height of the form as small as it could be could cause errors to occur,
depending on the type of controls on the form. This problem has been
fixed.
- The values 1, 2, and 24 are no longer
used for child window identifiers. This change was made to avoid using the
same values as those used for IDOK, IDCANCEL and MANIFEST_RESOURCE.
- Under the Form menu, the option of having
Auto C set the position and size of ActiveX Control Pad has been added.
When "Align With SuperEdi" is selected, ActiveX Control Pad's size and
position will be aligned with SuperEdi when it is run under Auto C.
Version 3.3.3 - April 30, 2009
- With the last few versions of Auto C,
there were problems using bitmaps, icons and cursors if they were not in
the EXE project folder. Auto C did not recognize them as being valid
files.
- Previously, the font size used for the
items in Auto C's main window was fixed. Now, if you have changed the font
sizes that Windows uses (it usually requires some third party tool to do
so), the font size used by Auto C can be increased up to a maximum size of
10.
Version 3.3.2 - April 15, 2009
- When using Watcom to link a Dll, the
command line was not displayed in SuperEdi's output window.
- Two files were unintentionally
included with the last two releases. They have been removed.
Version 3.3.1 - March 19, 2009
- The auto-generated function
LoadDllFunctions didn't work properly if the Dll was in a folder other
than the EXE application. This was only a problem with version 3.3 and no
prior versions.
Version 3.3 - March 18, 2009
- Global variables are now used for child
window HWNDs. The auto-generated functions GetItem and GetToolTipsHwnd
still exist, but using them in new code is no longer recommended.
- When running ActiveX Control Pad, if you selected
a control and pressed
enter, and then used the Apply Changes command, sometimes controls would
shift position by a few pixels, depending on the type of control selected.
This problem is now fixed.
- Specifying a tooltip for a combobox never
worked. This problem is now fixed.
- The name of the file used to launch
ActiveX Control Pad is now named "Auto C.alx" instead of "Pad File.alx".
- The name of the Dll that Auto C is now
named "AutoC.dll" instead of "AutoCDll.dll".
- The accelerator tables created by Auto C
now use all upper case characters for the keywords ALT, CONTROL, and
SHIFT.
- The code generated by the Update
Declarations command has been changed. The new version is simpler, more
readable, and is more consistent with documentation about using Dlls at
runtime.
- In the auto-generated function
LoadDllFunctions negative numbers were used as arguments to the ExitProcess function. These have now been changed to positive values. This
was done because some documentation says that only positive numbers (or
zero) should be used with ExitProcess.
Version 3.2.6 - February 13, 2009
- If you started Auto C by passing a
filename at the command line then the recent file list wasn't updated
correctly.
- If no documents were open in SuperEdi
then the tooltip for Auto C's Search Header Files button was inaccurate.
Version 3.2.5 - December 20, 2008
- When selecting an icon for a control to
display, sometimes an error would occur. This occurred only with some
icon files, ones that probably were corrupt.
This problem has been fixed.
Message boxes are now displayed when unusable
icons are found.
Version 3.2.4 - December 16, 2008
- The same macros available when using
SuperEdi's User Defined Tools can now be used with an Auto C custom
command. For example, use $(FilePath) to represent the full name of the
current document. Use $(FilePath) to represent the current file's path,
etc.. Refer to the User Defined Tools section of SuperEdi's help file for
more information.
Version 3.2.3 - December 8, 2008
-
Minor changes to Auto C's
setup program have been made. Previously, the setup program would
sometimes try and register AUTOC.OCX if VB6 runtime files were not
installed.
-
Under Auto C's File menu,
the Run Target EXE menu item was not properly updated. This problem has
been corrected.
Version 3.2.2 - December 5, 2008
- Minor improvements to Auto
C's appearance have been made. Also, the toolbar in the example project
has been set to display stock windows bitmaps. (In the previous release,
the toolbar had been unintentionally set to display file icons.)
Version 3.2.1 - December 2, 2008
- Some Microsoft documentation
says that a Tool Tip window should be made the topmost window after it
is created. Therefore the auto-generated code now includes a call to SetWindowPos that makes a tooltip window the topmost
window.
Version 3.2 - November 1, 2008
- Under Windows Me/98/NT4 the size of the
main window was not set correctly when ActiveX Control Pad was opened.
Version 3.1.9 - October 22, 2008
- When a new project was created, an unused
variable was declared at the beginning of the WinMain function. The
declaration has now been removed.
Version 3.1.8 - October 21, 2008
- You could not cut, copy & paste
checkbox controls because an error would occur when pasting.
Now you can cut, copy & paste all controls without errors occurring.
- When a new project was created, no
default string was assigned to be the program name. Now a default program
name is created when a new project is created.
Version 3.1.7 - October 17, 2008
- An error would occur or ActiveX Control Pad would freeze when
opening if you specified that a main window had a title bar but no icon or
close button. This problem is now fixed.
- If you changed Window Styles while
ActiveX Control Pad was open then the main window's size would increase by
a few pixels. This problem has been fixed.
- Auto C's help file and the VB Form that
is distributed with the Run-Time Dll Link example have been updated to
reflect the correct number and type of arguments to the dll's demo
function.
- A line has been added to the
SetFocusByTabstop auto-generated function to skip disabled controls.
Version 3.1.6 - October 14, 2008
- If you compiled an individual file with
Pelles C, and warnings but no errors occurred, Auto C would incorrectly
report that compilation was not successful when it actually was. Also,
with Borland and Pelles C warnings were displayed in blue instead of red
if no errors occurred.
- Under Windows Vista, sometimes system
error messages would appear if you closed Auto C while ActiveX Control Pad
was open or if you opened another project while ActiveX Control Pad was
open. Those message boxes should not appear anymore.
- There was a problem with the
Controls Demo example from version 3.1.5. Some preprocessor directives were in the
wrong place. Also, the wrong icon was included with the Play Sound
example.
- If you removed all controls of a given
type then the vertical spacing between auto-generated functions was lost.
Version 3.1.5 - October 11, 2008
- If any control had the design-time focus
when the Apply Changes command was used then all controls would shift
position by a few pixels. This problem is now fixed.
- When you changed the font for some
controls the Properties Box did not immediately show the new font.
Version 3.1.4 - October 8, 2008
- If you added files to an EXE project and
then later used the Apply Changes command, the names of the added files
were not correctly saved. The next time you opened the project you had to
repeat the process of adding the files to the project. This problem had
been fixed a long time ago but had somehow unknowingly returned, likely as
a result of using code from older backup files.
- If you removed all menus from a project
then one extra character was incorrectly removed from the project's RC
file. This was also a problem that had been fixed but had
recurred, probably for the same reason.
Version 3.1.3 - September 30, 2008
- The problem of controls unexpectedly shifting position by a few pixels
has been fixed. Previously, controls' left and top coordinates could
change as a result of applying changes, and this was not immediately
apparent.
- If you used menu accelerators then the
message loop near the end of WinMain was not correctly updated as you made
changes to the menu. This was a problem starting with version 3.1 and not
with prior versions.
- Fixed a problem with the Label ActiveX
control. If the label did not have a flat border style an error could
occur with if the width or height was made very small. Also, labels with
the etched border style were not assigned the correct style when opened
for editing in ActiveX Control Pad.
- Minor cosmetic changes have been made to
some of the auto-generated functions.
Version 3.1.2 - September 20, 2008
- A line of code had been inadvertently
deleted from an example file. The missing line has now been restored.
- Minor cosmetic changes have
been made to some of the auto-generated functions.
Version 3.1.1 - September 17, 2008
- If the Custom Command dialog box was open
when you started to open another project it remained open. If you then tried using a custom
command before opening another project an error would occur.
- The auto-generated function GetItem has
been revised and improved. The old version required that child window IDs
be consecutive numbers starting with 1. This requirement no longer exists.
Although negative values can't be used, the revised function works with any valid
positive values for child window identifiers.
- Minor revisions have been made to the
auto-generated functions that set menu bitmaps.
Version 3.1 - September 14, 2008
- The capability to terminate the process
of a custom command has been added. Previously you had to use Windows Task
Manager to manually terminate the process of a custom command if it didn't
end right away or got hung up.
- The Select Help File sub-menu under the
File menu didn't always accurately show what the currently selected help file
was. This problem is now fixed.
- The auto-generated source code used for
the message loop near the end of WinMain has been changed. The new code is
simpler and does a better job of showing what is actually going on within
the message loop when accelerator tables are used. Existing projects will
be updated to use the new code when the Apply Changes command is used.
- Some minor changes to the auto-generated
WndEnumProc functions have been made, just to make them a little smaller.
Version 3.0.9 - September 3, 2008
- If there were fewer than 8 files in Auto
C's recent file list, new files would be added to the end of the
list. This meant that the most recent project would be the first to be
discarded after the list grew to 8 files. Only when the list
contained 8 files would a new file be placed in the first position. Now, a new entry to the list
is always given the first position.
Version 3.0.8 - September 1, 2008
- When editing a project's form in ActiveX
Control Pad, the form will now have the window styles that you specify.
Exceptions to this are that at design-time the form
will always be sizable and have a border around the client
area. Otherwise, it will have the styles you specify.
Version 3.0.7 - August 28, 2008
- If you installed ActiveX Control Pad
while Auto C was running and tried to use it right away, a problem would
occur the very first time, and then it would work OK each subsequent time. Now you
should be able to install ActiveX Control Pad while Auto C is running and
use it immediately without any problems.
- The @ character is now excluded from
project file titles. With Auto C, you can use any valid Windows filename
except for filenames whose titles contain leading or trailing spaces, the
at symbol(@), the apostrophe character('), or the ampersand character(&).
Version 3.0.6 - August 18, 2008
- Improvements to Auto C's functions menu
have been made. It now works faster than it did with previous versions.
Version 3.0.5 - August 16, 2008
- Sometimes Auto C's functions menu didn't work
correctly if a function name contained another function name (for example,
Function1 and Function10).
- Previously, nothing prevented you from
trying to search header files for a phrase that contained spaces. If you
did, problems would occur. Now when searching header files you must
specify a string that does not contain spaces.
Version 3.0.4 - August 2, 2008
- At design-time in ActiveX Control Pad, if
you clicked an option button and then pressed enter, the option button's
value would be set to True. This is now fixed. Clicking an option button
won't automatically set the value to True. Use the properties box to set
an Option button's initial value.
- Sometimes at design-time in ActiveX
Control Pad a default icon was displayed instead of the icon you had
selected for the main window.
- The last two versions of Auto C's setup
program forced you to uninstall the existing program before
installing the new version. You no longer have to do this. You can once
again install Auto C on top of a prior version.
- The installer size is smaller because it
is compressed more.
Version 3.0.3 - July 31, 2008
- If no documents were open in SuperEdi and
you tried to use Auto C's File menu to select a help file an error would
occur. This is now fixed. This was only a problem with version 3.0.2 and
no prior versions.
- When you opened a project's form for
editing, a CheckBox's Checked property or an OptionButton's Value property
was not set correctly. This problem has been corrected.
Version 3.0.2 - July 28, 2008
- Previously, Auto C.exe would register
AUTOC.OCX at the time of first use. Now Auto C's setup program will
register it if FM20.DLL is found.
- The way in which a project's form is
opened is improved. Opening ActiveX Control Pad should be much faster.
- Improvements to Auto C's File menu were
made so that it now has a smoother appearance. Previously the File menu
appeared a little "jerky" because items within it were being drawn as it
was clicked.
Version 3.0.1 - July 26, 2008
- Fixed problem where sometimes system
error messages would be displayed when you tried to start Auto C.
- ActiveX Control Pad is no longer required
to run Auto C. This change was made in order to reduce the possibility of
an error occurring when Auto C starts up, and to make installing Auto C
easier. Auto C no longer references FM20.DLL directly to use MS Forms 2.0
objects. It uses those objects using late-binding only. This means that
FM20.DLL does not have to be registered on your system in order for Auto C to
start up and run.
- The file Auto C.ocx is also no longer
referenced through early binding. It will be installed but it won't be
registered until after ActiveX Control Pad is installed and FM20.dll is
registered on your system.
- The help file now includes additional
troubleshooting information that can be helpful if problems occur when you
try to run Auto C.
- A setting has been added that can be used
if error messages appear whenever you close ActiveX Control Pad. Select
"Hide message boxes" from the Form menu. Auto C will then try to suppress
the error message boxes.
- Auto C's Application Manifest is now a
separate file named Auto C.exe.manifest. Previously it was part of Auto C.exe
as a resource. If a severe error occurs when you try to start Auto C, rename the
manifest file or move it to another location. In extreme cases this can
allow Auto C to run under Windows XP or later.
- With one exception, all of the files that
Auto C installs are now kept in Auto C's program folder. Previously, two
files (AutoC.ocx and AutoCDll.dll) were installed to your system folder.
It has now been determined that the files do not have to be in the system
folder and that keeping them in Auto C's program folder can potentially
make troubleshooting a little easier. The exception is the file
COMDLG32.OCX. It is still installed to your System or System32 folder,
depending on your version of Windows.
- When you run a custom command, Auto C now
displays the return value (exit code) from the custom command in addition
to anything it writes to StdOut and StdErr.
Version 3.0 - July 3, 2008
- A new system for determining window sizes
is now used. The size of the main window and the
position and size of controls should now be more accurate.
- When building or re-building an EXE
project, sometimes Auto C didn't detect that an error had occurred when
compiling a source file. Now, the building process should always stop if
an individual object file is not successfully created.
- Sometimes if you started to browse for the
Borland compiler but then cancelled, Auto C would not properly handle the
cancellation. This is now corrected.
- Slight changes to the example
projects have been made. The auto-generated comments are improved.
Version 2.9.6 - June 21, 2008
- If a control had an Accelerator key
sometimes the key would be lost when ActiveX Control Pad was opened. This
problem should now be fixed.
- Under some circumstances it was possible
for the Main Window's caption to disappear in ActiveX Control Pad. Now,
the caption should always appear correctly.
- The default bar color of a progress bar
was not correct, and you could not specify that a progress bar should use
default colors.
- If you started Auto C by passing a
filename at the command line, you could not open a different project. The
first project would always be re-opened if you tried to open a different
project. This is now fixed.
Version 2.9.5 - June 14, 2008
- An extra leading space was added to the
main window's caption when displayed in ActiveX Control Pad. The extra
space has been removed.
Version 2.9.4 - June 4, 2008
- Under Windows Vista, if you changed menu
background colors then Auto C's menus did not appear correctly. They now
appear correctly.
- If you compiled a file individually and
there was an error, Auto C did not put SuperEdi's caret on the line with
the error and make SuperEdi the foreground window. Now it does.
- If some tabs of a Tabstrip control had
tooltips and others did not, the tabs without tooltips could be assigned
the literal "NULL" as the tooltip. This is now fixed.
Version 2.9.3 - June 4, 2008
- The window position of ActiveX Control Pad
was not saved when it was closed. This is now fixed: When ActiveX Control
Pad is run it will have the size and position it had when it was
last closed. (This was only a problem with Auto C versions 2.9.1 and 2.9.2.)
- Sometimes the function
Toolbar_DropDownClick would be added to the auto-generated source file
when it wasn't needed. (This was only a problem with Auto C versions 2.9.1
and 2.9.2.)
- Previously, under Windows Vista you had to
right-click and select "Run as administrator" to start Auto C. You no
longer have to do this.
Version 2.9.2 - June 1, 2008
- Version 2.9.1 had a problem in that it
would fail to recognize that an EXE project source file had errors, and
would proceed with building the project. This problem was corrected as
soon as possible.
Version 2.9.1 - June 1, 2008
- When you compiled Dll project files
individually Auto C would incorrectly report that the file had not been
successfully compiled when it actually had been.
(This was only a problem with version 2.9, not with prior versions.)
- Files added to an EXE project were not
compiled in the same order that they were linked in. Although this was not
really a problem, this has been changed so that source files are now
compiled in the same order that the corresponding object files are linked.
- An Open command has been added to the File
menu. Use it to open a different project without closing Auto C.
Previously it was necessary to exit Auto C in order to open a different
project. Now, Windows Vista users don't have to restart Auto C by
right-clicking and selecting "Run as administrator" to open another
project.
Version 2.9 - May 26, 2008
- If the form or menu was open for editing
and a second instance of Auto C was started, problems with closing ActiveX
Control Pad would occur. This is now fixed. If a second instance of Auto C
is started while Auto C is running, the first instance will be closed
right away.
- If you close Auto C while the form or menu
is open for editing ActiveX Control Pad will be closed without
prompting you to save changes.
- The way in which Auto C closes is now
faster.
- The -q option (quiet output) is no longer
used with the Watcom linker.
Version 2.8.9 - May 7, 2008
- The Manifest files created by Auto C now
have a simpler form.
- For Windows VIsta users, message boxes
have been added to Auto C's setup program and to Auto c.exe that inform
users of the need to start by right-clicking Auto C's icon and selecting
"Run as administrator".
Version 2.8.8 - April 24, 2008
- If the name of the target EXE contained a
period (.) then it could not be run from within Auto C. This is now fixed.
- The way in which filenames are validated
has been updated. Now, any valid folder name may be used and any valid
filename may be used, except if the file title contains an ampersand (&)
or apostrophe (').
Version 2.8.7 - April 17, 2008
- If you tried to compile a DLL project file
individually when you had selected Borland C++ as the DLL compiler, the
file would be compiled in C, not C++. This is now fixed.
- Sometimes Auto C would incorrectly report
that a file hadn't been successfully compiled when it actually had been.
This should now be fixed.
- A minor change was made to the way a DLL
is linked with Watcom C.
Version 2.8.6 - March 18, 2008
- If you had no compilers installed and you
tried to search header files an error would occur. This is now fixed.
- A registry key created by Auto C was not
deleted when uninstalling.
Version 2.8.5 - February 18, 2008
- When browsing for a help file there was a
problem if you tried to select a Windows Help (*.hlp) file. This is now
fixed.
- The directive #define WIN32_LEAN_AND_MEAN
has been added to source files. This greatly reduces compile time,
especially when using Borland or Pelles C..
Version 2.8.4 - February 5, 2008
- If a DLL project contained a resource (RC) file, and you were using
Watcom C++, then compiling the RC file individually would not work because
Auto C used the wrong command. This is now fixed.
Version 2.8.3 - January 28, 2008
- Sometimes the toolbar control could be moved and
resized at design-time in ActiveX Control Pad when it should not have
been. Now the toolbar's position and size are always fixed.
- When closing Auto C sometimes SuperEdi would remain running
and it was unclear whether or not Auto C had ended. Both Auto C and SuperEdi
should now promptly close when you close Auto C.
- Some example files have been revised.
Version 2.8.2 - January 16, 2008
- Problems with the wrong bitmaps being assigned to
toolbar buttons and an error occurring are now fixed. (This should only
have been a problem with version 2.8.1)
- The toolbar property page showed the bitmaps associated
with a Windows XP theme even if you weren't running Windows XP. This is
now fixed.
- The symbol that represents the Apply Changes command has been changed.
Hopefully the new symbol will do a better job of illustrating what the
command does because the symbol is now a conventional icon that users are
more familiar with.
Version 2.8.1 - January 12, 2008
- If Watcom was the only supported compiler you had
installed, some of the commands under the Compile and Run drop-down menu
were disabled when they should not have been. This is now fixed.
- An extra line of code that had been left in an example file has now
been removed.
- The help file has been updated. An inaccuracy in the Description of
Auto-Generated Code was corrected. (A toolbar's tooltip text is now copied
to the szText member. Previously tip text was assigned to the lpszText
member.)
Version 2.8 - January 8, 2008
- The Toolbar design-time control is much improved. The
TBSTYLE_LIST style is now supported, as well as the BTNS_AUTOSIZE and
BTNS_WHOLEDROPDOWN styles. Also, toolbar buttons can now display icons.
- A scrollbar with a vertical orientation would have the wrong
orientation when opened in ActiveX Control Pad. This is now fixed.
- The name of the target dll could not be changed using the Dll Project
Options dialog box. This is now fixed.
- Under Windows Vista, controls with the default font of 8pt. MS Sans
Serif would have a different font at runtime than at design-time. This is
now fixed.
- Line endings are now uniform. Previously some blank lines ended with
just a line feed and no carriage return.
Version 2.7.5 - August 23, 2007
- A Toolbar button can now display any of the stock
Windows bitmaps.
- At design-time in ActiveX Control Pad, the width of a toolbar
drop-down arrow will now always be the default size for the Windows
version. (Changed with version 2.8) At runtime, the width will vary
depending on the actual menu size setting.
- The ability to select Windows Help (*.hlp) files under Windows Vista
has been reinstated. You must have the appropriate Microsoft supplied
viewer to use Windows Help files under Windows Vista. Search Microsoft's
website for the file Windows6.0-KB917607-x86.msu. It allows
you to use old style help files under Vista.
- Both versions of Win32.hlp (the Borland version and the LCC-Win32
version) are now available as pre-defined choices for help files.
- Verified that Auto C works OK with Open Watcom C/C++ 1.7.
Version 2.7.4 - August 11, 2007
- The width of the elements of the Toolbar design-time ActiveX control
were incorrect. The width of a toolbar at design-time did not accurately
reflect the toolbar's width at runtime. Now, the width of Toolbar buttons,
separators and drop-down arrows should be accurate under all Windows
versions. This applies only to toolbars with the Windows Classic
appearance. A toolbar's width may be different depending on the XP theme
or "skin".
- Auto C's appearance under Windows Vista is improved.
Version 2.7.3 - July 19, 2007
- Under Windows 2000, when linking a DLL using Watcom C, Auto C did not
read the exports from the DLL's library file correctly. Because of this,
exported functions were not made visible externally by their undecorated
names.
Version 2.7.2 - July 18, 2007
- Fixed problem with using the Add/Update Declarations command.
Previously, only the first Dll function found was processed. This command
was always intended to process all exported Dll functions. (This was fixed
with version 2.7.1)
- Under Windows NT4, under some circumstances Auto C would freeze at
startup.
- When using the toolbox, added the capability to right-click the
toolbox in order to add a control.
- In ActiveX Control Pad, the ScrollBar control and the UpDown control
always appeared in the Windows Classic form. Now, under Windows XP or
later those controls will be drawn at design-time using the selected
theme. The ListBox control also did not appear correctly at design-time.
- Borland cfg files were always overwritten at startup. This is no
longer the case; advanced users can modify the cfg files and the
modifications will be preserved the next time that project is opened.
- The commands used to make projects with Open Watcom have been revised.
- The Check Box you could check to create and use a Manifest file has
been moved to the Window Styles dialog box.
- Auto C's main window and toolbox are now tool windows without icons
instead of standard windows.
- There is no longer an "Open" command available from Auto C's File
menu.
Version 2.7.1 - June 29, 2007
- Added support for Open Watcom C/C++ compiler. Open Watcom version 1.6
from December of 2006 is the only version of Open Watcom that has been
tested with Auto C. Previous versions are untested with Auto C.
- At design-time sometimes a button would not display a bitmap or icon
correctly. (For example, a button would display the text "BEANY" instead
of displaying the bitmap resource named BEANY.) Hopefully this is now
fixed.
- Auto C no longer moves or re-sizes SuperEdi or ActiveX Control Pad.
This was something left over from Instant C and was determined to be not
useful.
- Although use of a module definition file with Pelles C was
discontinued, Auto C still created empty .DEF files that were never used.
The files are not created anymore.
- The position of Auto C's main window and Toolbox window are now stored
in the registry.
- Fixed problem with using the Add/Update Declarations command. Only the
first Dll function found was processed. This command was always intended
to process all exported Dll functions.
Version 2.7 - June 14, 2007
- Fixed error that would occur if Auto C was used to create two or more
files to be added to a project.
Version 2.6 - June 12, 2007
- In the Play Sound example project, the names of lib files had been
inadvertently removed from the linker response files. This was only a
problem with version 2.6.
Version 2.5 - June 12, 2007
- Added the capability to make a Dll in C++ using Borland.
- Auto C no longer uses a module definition file when creating a Dll
with Pelles C.
Version 2.4 - June 5, 2007
- Fixed problem with the Slider control. At design-time the slider was
not created and did not appear. This was only a problem with version 2.3.
Previous versions did not have this problem.
Version 2.3 - June 1, 2007
- Fixed "Invalid Property Value" error at startup. This problem did not
appear on the author's machine until recently.
- Fixed problem where if you altered certain portions of the
auto-generated code and then tried to add a menu, an error would occur.
- Problems with Auto C's height being too short are hopefully fixed.
Other window sizing problems are somewhat improved, but there could still
be remaining issues when running Auto C on some machines with non-standard
displays.
- Two of the example projects contained unique code that caused the code
for added buttons to be put in the wrong place within the function
Button_Click. This was only a problem with the examples and should not
have been a problem with any other files. Corrections were made to the way
code is added so that the potential for this problem no longer exists.
- The number of recent file slots has been increased from 4 to 8.
Version 2.2 - May 21, 2007
- Added code that draws controls using the colors specified by the
Desktop Appearance settings. Previously, Auto C always used black for text
and white for window backgrounds, etc.. Updated the ActiveX Controls as
well; previously some controls used the wrong color (COLOR_BTNTEXT was
used where COLOR_WINDOWTEXT should have been used and similar issues).
Still, not all controls will appear at design time exactly as they will at
runtime.
- Changed the way Auto C positions itself on the screen. The default
startup location is now in the upper-left corner. Previously Auto C's
default startup position was in the upper-right corner.
- When closing, Auto C will now try to restore SuperEdi's original
screen position and size. Auto C will also try and restore SuperEdi's
toolbar windows to their original show state.
Version 2.1 - May 21, 2007
- Added the ability to use a manifest file so that Windows XP style
visual themes can be applied to the executables created with Auto C.
- Added a DefaultButton property to the CommandButton control. If you
wish, one command button on the form can be the default button and will be
created with the BS_DEFPUSHBUTTON style. All the other command buttons
will be created with the BS_PUSHBUTTON style.
- Fixed problem with using the Remove DLL command to remove the
auto-generated code that loads a dll and functions. One character too many
was removed from the auto-generated header file when the prototype for the
function LoadDllFunctions was removed.
- Fixed problem where if files were added to a project that did not have
spaces in their names, and the project's main file did contain spaces, and
Borland C++ was used, linking didn't work because some filenames were not
enclosed in quotes when needed.
- Fixed problem with using filenames that contained commas but no
spaces. Previously this didn't work because Auto C didn't enclose them in
quotes.
- Fixed problems with using Auto C to create a new file to be added it
to the project.
- Fixed other miscellaneous issues pertaining to adding files to a
project. Disallowed the use of filenames that contain the Ampersand
character. Disallowed the use of filenames with trailing spaces.
- Fixed problems with using File Open and Save dialog boxes: Sometimes
selecting Cancel wasn't properly handled.
Version 2.0 - May 12, 2007
- Fixed problem with Toolbar control: Sometimes an invalid or unusable
button ID was generated when you added buttons to a toolbar.
- Fixed problem where entering an invalid URL or HTML filename to
display caused an error.
- Added a Progress Bar as a design-time only ActiveX Control.
- Added a new auto-generated function to return the Tool Tip window's
handle. Use GetToolTipsHwnd() to return the tooltip window's HWND.
- Auto C now detects if your Taskbar is not bottom aligned. Auto C won't
place any windows on top of the taskbar if it is not set to auto-hide.
- Auto C now remembers which compilers you have selected. When you
restart Auto C, the compiler you last used for an EXE project or DLL
project will again be the selected compiler for that type of project.
- Added code to allow for the use of quotation marks (") in tooltips and
toolbar button captions. Previously errors would occur if you tried to
place a quote in a TabStrip tab's tooltip or a Toolbar button's tooltip or
caption (by using \" ).
Version 1.9 - April 27, 2007
- Improved the way Auto C starts up and opens a project. This process is
now faster and smoother, and unnecessary message boxes aren't displayed.
- Added the option of having Auto C's start-up position be on the left
side of the screen instead of always being on the right side. If Auto C is
on the left side of the screen when you close it, the next time you start
Auto C it will be in the upper left corner.
- Simplified the way Auto C places SuperEdi's caret on a specific line
to further reduce the possibility of an error.
- Re-worked the Play Sound example project.
Version 1.8 - April 12, 2007
- Fixed problem where RC file contents could be lost or garbled when
updating menus.
Version 1.7 - April 12, 2007
- Fixed problem where files that had been added to a project were
omitted from the project when it was later re-opened.
- When a Label's font changed, the change wasn't shown immediately in
the Properties Box.
- A minor revision was made to the function MouseOverControl. A
statement assigning the HWND of the control the mouse is over to a static
variable was moved to a different location. Previously it had been near
the end of the function, now it is near the beginning of the function.
Version 1.6 - April 4, 2007
- There was a problem with one of the example files in the v1.5
distribution. It had been altered and hadn't been restored to it's
original state. This is corrected with the 1.6 distribution.
Version 1.5 - April 4, 2007
- Version 1.4 had a problem in that the reference to the ActiveX
controls wasn't set correctly when it was compiled. This is corrected in
version 1.5. Version 1.4 was only posted for a short time, but the version
numbers were incremented anyway.
- Fixed problem with opening the help file from the start menu. The
wrong filename was specified.
Version 1.4 - April 4, 2007
- Updated and tested with latest version of SuperEdi (4.0, 4.0.U)
- Fixed problem with right-clicking a file or using the drop-down menu
to compile an individual file. Sometimes this didn't work because the
file's extension was omitted.
- Enabled using the compile & run button even if no supported compilers
were found. Previously, if you had Borland installed but it wasn't in the
default location, and had no other compilers installed, it wasn't clear
how to specify the Borland compiler's location. Now the project options
dialog box can be more easily displayed, making it a little easier to
specify the Borland compiler's location.
Version 1.3 - April 2, 2007
- The help file is now an HTML Help file. The Property Pages no longer
have a button that you can click for help, you must press F1.
- At startup, if SuperEdi is already running, Auto C will close and
restart SuperEdi. This is to ensure that code page and unicode detection
are turned off. If they are enabled when not needed, the contents of a
file can become garbled unexpectedly.
- Disallowed use of LCC-Win32 under Windows 98/ME. The latest version of
LCC-Win32 requires Windows 5.0 (Windows 2000) or higher.
- Fixed problem that occurred when overwriting an old project. If you
selected a previously existing project name for a new project, intending
to overwrite the old project files, some files were not re-written.
Version 1.2 - March 24, 2007
- Fixed problem with deleting multiple controls and one of them, but not
all of them, was a control in the button class. The function Button_Click
was not updated correctly.
- Fixed error that would occur if you added a menu or menus, and then
later completely removed all menus.
- Fixed problem that occurred when linking DLLs with LCC-WIn32 if you
also had Pelles C installed. Auto C used the same environment block for
both compilers, and LCC's implib.exe wouldn't run correctly if it was run
in a process that used an environment block created for use with Pelles C.
Version 1.1 - March 22, 2007
- Environment variables are no longer used. Previously it was necessary
to add the name of a compiler's BIN folder to your PATH environment
variable, and using Pelles C required additional environment variables.
The need to use environment variables was eliminated in order to make
setting up Auto C easier. (June 29, 2007 - The Environment Variables that
Open Watcom creates when it is installed are required.)
- Changed the way Auto C places SuperEdi's caret at a specific line in a
file. The SuperEdi application doesn't blink or flash when Auto C does
this any more.
- Made corrections to help file, which in one location referred to an
example project by the wrong name and also used incorrect terminology.
Version 1.0 - March 20, 2007
- Updated for latest versions of SuperEdi, 3.9.2 and 3.9.2.U
Auto C is based on Instant C (by the same author). All know issues with
Instant C have been corrected in Auto C. The name was changed because Auto C
is fundamentally different from Instant C, and Instant C projects are not
compatible with Auto C. Many improvements have also been made. A
pre-configured replacement toolbox for use with ActiveX Control Pad is
provided. All the design-time ActiveX controls are now custom Auto C
controls, except for the Tabstrip. A toolbar design-time ActiveX control has
been added. Using ActiveX Control Pad is now improved, and it runs even
better now than it did under Instant C. Top of
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