Dealing with pointers calling into a C++ DLL from Visual Basic (VB6)

1) I think you can use the "As Any" declaration type

2) If you are talking about an internal class, I don't think you can pass pointers of it to and from VB unless it is an ActiveX object or a struct (user-defined type).

3) For char you would declare "As Byte" in VB

4) char pointer buffer for a string would be a byte array in VB, e.g.,   Declare SomeFunction Lib "mydll" (ByVal AVariable() As Byte)



I don't do any C++ programming so these are just speculated answers...

Thanks for the suggestions but
1) doesnt work. As Any cant be a return type on a DLL function declaration
2) I was told there is a way to get at the memory and overlay it but I havent had luck doing so.
3) doesnt work. if I wanted to assign "172.16.6.113" as the IP address I cant store it into a Byte array. An assignment that isnt a number into a Byte field does not work. Its a Type Mistmatch. Tried using CByte method as well and that won't work either.
4) see 3

Just a char should correspond to a byte, and yes, you would want to return the ASCII value of that character into your byte.  A char * should correspond to a byte array, with the same limitations I just mentioned.

Regarding the memory overlay, etc...it seems an awfully unorthodox method of working in the program.  I would consider finding an ActiveX approach (the best way to work with objects between the two languages) or handle all class functions internally, using exported functions to allow VB to manipulate the properties and use the class.

If interested, this is the *proper* way to pass string to and from your dll to VB:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/Q187/9/12.asp&NoWebContent=1

Was able to use Asc() to get the ascii value put into the byte. Whether the dll is able to handle this appropriately I can't tell yet without being able to resolve my other issues. I competely agree this program is "unorthodox" but the client keeps pushing for it even though I keep telling him I don't think its possible.

Can you use As Variant as a return type?  What exactly are you trying to return?  If its just a pointer, then As Long should do it.

What other issues are still outstanding?

If I do it as a Variant return type and try to store it on return I get "Bad DLL calling convention."
        Dim myVariant As Variant
        myVariant = deStateIn(sizeRet)
deStateIn returns a void*. In normal use it is actually returning a pointer to a C++ user defined object, which is what I need to get at. If I did return the value as a long since its just a pointer then I need a way to dereference it like you would in C++ which is not an option in VB.

You can do a trick to dereference an object pointer back into an object in VB, but VB must be aware of this object (e.g., be able to declare a variable of that type).

I already have a type set up in VB to mimic the structure of the C++ type I am expecting. Its a rather long structure so I cut most of it, and due to security issues.
*** VB Code ***
Public Type pduEntityStateBaseType
   version              As Byte
   exercise             As Byte
   type                 As Byte
   protocol_family      As Byte
   time_stamp           As Long
   length               As Integer
   entitystate_pad2(2)  As Byte
   ..
   ..
End Type

*** C++ Code ***
typedef struct {
     UINT8      version;        
     UINT8      exercise;
     UINT8      type;
     UINT8      protocol_family;
     UINT32      time_stamp;
     UINT16      length;
     UINT8      entitystate_pad2[2];
     ..
     ..
} pduEntityStateBaseType;

I know windows has a MSVBVM60.DLL which has calls such as GetMem4 which would get a long (32-bit) value at a supplied location.

' MSVBVM60.DLL functions
Public Declare Sub GetMem1 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, RetVal As Byte)
Public Declare Sub GetMem2 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, RetVal As Integer)
Public Declare Sub GetMem4 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, RetVal As Long)
Public Declare Sub GetMem8 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, RetVal As Currency)
Public Declare Sub PutMem1 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, ByVal NewVal As Byte)
Public Declare Sub PutMem2 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, ByVal NewVal As Integer)
Public Declare Sub PutMem4 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, ByVal NewVal As Long)
Public Declare Sub PutMem8 Lib "msvbvm60" (ByVal Addr As Long, ByVal NewVal As Currency)

Dim vptr As Long
Dim newvalue As Long
' get the long (32-bit) (4-byte) value at the location (same as a C dereference of a pointer)
Call GetMem4(vptr, newvalue)

Problem is these gets arent able to get something large enough for the object I have. I was told to try using these get calls and overlay the information on the user defined object but I can't get that to work either.

For others that have to deal with pointers try this site. It gives good examples of using CopyMemory.
http://www.codeproject.com/vbscript/how_to_do_pointers_in_visual_basic.asp