Licensing of TreeView

[mark]

I was told earlier today that it is not allowed to distribute the apps built
in Excel with the Treeview and ImageList controls, unless each machine that
they run on has a design time license.

What I seem to be experiencing, is that that is true for the Microsoft
Treeview Control, Version 5.0 (SP2), but that that is not true for the
Microsoft Treeview Control, version 6.0 .

Before I continue to develop something in Excel (which would need to be run
on machines without VB6) which uses the TreeView, can someone offer some more
info on the licensing?

Thanks,
Mark

 

[Robin Hammond]

Mark,

I think it runs as follows but would somebody please correct me if I am
wrong:

1. The treeview and imagelist controls are part of the Microsoft Windows
Common Controls 6 activex control which comes with VB6 (but has also
probably been installed on many but not all machines by some other program).
2. To use these controls in your project you should have a VB6 license on
the development machine (or Office Developer 2000 might also have included
it - not sure about this). Possession of this license gives you the right to
use the controls, package and redistribute them.
3. You cannot be sure that the controls exist on your target machines, so
you have to package and redistribute the controls with your product as
described in this MSDN article, and make sure they are registered on the
target machine:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;305528
4. If done correctly the controls will then be on the runtime machine, but
the runtime machine will not be licensed to use the controls for repackaging
or distribution given that it does not have a vb6 license.
5. You should go with version 6 if you can.

Hope that makes sense.

Robin Hammond
www.enhanceddatasystems.com