VB Forum / COM / July 2008

Hello All COM Developers!

I would like to know whether any of you have had experience debugging
side-by-side applications that are written in VB6?

In other words, let's say that different versions of the same product are
installed on one PC side-by-side. Both versions of the product use their own
COM types and now you would like to debug one version. Since the activation
information now lies in the manifest files for each version (instead of the
Windows registry), what is the best scenario to open the desired version in
VB6 and start debugging?

I see two scenarios of debugging here:

1. Register the COM types in the Windows registry for the application that
you want to debug and then open the application's project in VB6.

2. Add additional code to the application project to use the Activation
Context API and load the manifests for the COM types that the application
depends on.

I see scenario #2 as being more elegant but harder to implement in code.
This will keep the Windows registry clean (without COM activation entries)
allowing you to easily develop and test on the same PC.

On the other hand, Scenario 1 is the easiest way out since it uses the
traditional built-in implementation of VB6 to search the Windows registry for
the COM activation information. However, you have to remember to register the
collection of COM types that the application uses before loading the
application's project in VB6. This also pollutes the PC with COM entries in
the Windows registry, forcing you to either clean up before doing run-time
testing or test on another 'clean' PC altogether to ensure that side-by-side
is maintained.

I really would like the community's input on this and share your experiences.

Thanks.