HowTo: Support MS Office applications, Internet Explorer and Outlook Express in one project
Yes, you read that right, you can do this in one Visual Studio project, but not in one solution. And yes, you can do it using the Add-in Express tools. There are only two details you need to know. Firstly, the Add-in Express COM Add-in project must be the main project. And secondly, after adding the Add-in Express IE Module to the main project, you need to modify the setup project.
Well, let's get down to business:
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Create a main project using the Add-in Express COM Add-in wizard.
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Add a module to the main project to support Outlook Express and Windows Mail. Right-click on the main project -> Add -> New Item -> expand the Add-in Express Items -> click on Modules -> choose the Outlook Express Module item and click the Add button.
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Add a module to the main project to support Internet Explorer. Right-click on the main project -> Add -> New Item -> expand the Add-in Express Items -> select the Internet Explorer item in the Categories tree view -> choose the ADX IE Module item and click the Add button.
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Expand your setup project in the Solution Explorer, right-click on the Detected Dependencies and click on the Refresh Dependencies context menu item. After refreshing select the AddinExpress.IE.tlb and ieframe.dll items. Set the Exclude property to True for both dependencies.
So, now your project is ready and you can use Add-ins Express for Office and .net components, Add-in Express for Internet Explorer and .net components, and Add-in Express for Outlook Express and Windows Mail components on the appropriate modules.
There you are! That just about wraps up business for the day.