Introduction

1 Introduction

Welcome to Outside In Viewer for ActiveX, the fastest, easiest way to add powerful file access capabilities to your Visual Basic/C++ applications. Whether you're an experienced programmer or just learning, this control will allow you to view, print, cut, copy and paste more than 600 document types with just a few keystrokes.

Note:

For new functionality information see, What's New guide.

This powerful control is based on the core viewing technology found in mainstream applications. You will not find another file access system on the market with the variety of formats, up-to-date filters and fidelity as found in Outside In.

There may be references to other Outside In Technology SDKs within this manual. To obtain complete documentation for any other Outside In product, see Middleware documentation page and click Outside In Technology link below.

This chapter includes the following sections:

1.1 What Does the Outside In Viewer for ActiveX Do?

The ActiveX control may be used for simple applications that need to view a document as well as complex custom applications that require searching, e-mail attachment viewing, or custom publishing techniques. Outside In can also add value to Intranet technologies with its support for documents embedded within HTML and XML files.

You'll quickly discover the ease of integration and the power behind the Outside In technology.

This ActiveX control is based on the industry's leading file-access technology and integrated into mainstream applications from companies such as Microsoft, Lotus, Xerox and DEC. Outside In provides file viewing capabilities which offer software developers the highest fidelity, best performing and most stable support for the broadest number of file types across multiple operating systems.

There are several benefits to using Outside In over other solutions:

Industry-standard filters: The Outside In viewing filters have been tested by hundreds of thousands of users while embedded within the industry's top software programs. This ensures high-quality filters that are submitted to constant quality control procedures.
Up-to-date file formats: One of the most difficult aspects of creating file filters is keeping them up-to-date with evolving formats. Because of relationships with leading vendors, Oracle's filters handle the latest versions of the various document files.
Speed of development: The control is extremely easy to use. Just place the control on a form, set a few properties, and a complete application for viewing documents is accessible.

1.2 Definition of Terms

Term	Definition
Developer	Someone integrating this technology into another technology or application. Most likely this is you, the reader.
Source File	The file the developer wishes to view.

1.3 Directory Structure

Each Outside In product has an sdk directory, under which there is a subdirectory for the platform on which the product ships. For the Viewer for ActiveX, the structure is ax/sdk/ax_win-x86-32_sdk or ax/sdk/ax_win-x86-64_sdk. Under this directory are the following three subdirectories:

install - Contains files needed to set up the control for demo purposes.
redist - Contains only the files that the customer is allowed to redistribute. These include all the compiled modules, filter support files, cmmap000.bin, and third-party libraries.
sdk - Contains the other subdirectories that used to be at the root-level of an sdk (common and resource).

In the root platform directory (for example, ax/sdk/ax_win-x86-32_sdk), there is one file: README. This explains the contents of the sdk.