ActiveX Control Features

AddFlow ActiveX control has been written with Visual C++ 6.0 and it is a MFC (Microsoft Foundation Class) based ActiveX control.

An AddFlow diagram is a set of objects that can be linked each other. The objects are called nodes and the lines that connect objects are called links. AddFlow provides two ways to build diagrams:

• interactive way (with the mouse): see the Quick Start of the help file in order to know how to interactively draw a diagram.
• programmatic way with the AddFlow API.

Following is a list of the main AddFlow features. Note that all those features are encapsulated in a small (342 Ko only), robust, fast and easy to use ActiveX control.

General

• Runtime-royalty free
• Digitally signed
• Interactive and programmatic drawings
• Navigation (You can access every nodes and links of a diagram with just 5 properties).
• Collections support (nodes, links, selected nodes, selected links)
• Customization: many properties allowing to customize the control (CanDrawNode, CanMoveNode, ReadOnly, etc...)

Input/output

• Metafiles support (WMF, EMF)
• Serialization of diagrams (LoadFile, SaveFile methods)
• Clipboard management
• Printing and print previewing
• XML support via an external DLL (code provided)

Interactivity

• Scrolling (interactive and programmatic)
• Autoscrolling
• Selection and Multiselection of nodes and links(interactive and programmatic).
• Nodes stay connected when moved or resized.
• Multilevel Undo/Redo feature (V4)

Display facilities

• Back picture
• Zooming
• Grid support (ShowGrid, SnapToGrid, GridColor, GridStyle, xGrid, yGrid properties)

Data

• Ability to associate a text, a unique key, a tooltip, a tag and a variant(V4) to a node or a link

Nodes and links

• Change painting order of objects (ZOrderIndex property)
• Distinct colors for each object (FillColor, ForeColor, DrawColor)
• Distinct fonts for each object
• Distinct drawing styles (DrawStyle property)
• Hidden objects
• node and link runtime property pages(V4)

Links

• links. A link can be composed of many segments.
• Curved links (Bezier curves and spline(V4) curves)
• Rigid links. If a link is rigid, it follows (without being stretched) its origin node when this origin node is being dragged.
• Reflexive links
• Links having only vertical and horizontal segments
• Ability to adjust the position of the first and last point of a link
• 43 arrow styles for links
• Link jumps (V4)

Nodes

• Ability to associate a picture (bitmap, standard or enhanced metafile, icon, GIF, JPEG) to a node
• 46 distinct shapes for nodes
• Transparent nodes
• Text alignment
• Autosize options for nodes
• Shadows (V4)
• Standard "in place editing" (V4)

AddFlow ActiveX Control Main