Displaying file properties from within VB6

If you right-click a file name in Explorer and select Properties, Windows displays a dialog box with a variety of information about the file, including its size, creation and modification dates, and attributes. It can be a useful technique to find the properties of a file from within a VB6 program. I'll show you how to do that in this tip.

First, you need to declare a UDT, some constants, and an API function in a module in your program.

Public Const SW_SHOW = 5
 Public Const SEE_MASK_INVOKEIDLIST = &HC
 Public Type SHELLEXECUTEINFO
    cbSize As Long
    fMask As Long
    hwnd As Long
    lpVerb As String
    lpFile As String
    lpParameters As String
    lpDirectory As String
    nShow As Long
    hInstApp As Long
    ' optional fields
    lpIDList As Long
    lpClass As String
    hkeyClass As Long
    dwHotKey As Long
    hIcon As Long
    hProcess As Long
 End Type
 
 Public Declare Function ShellExecuteEx Lib "shell32.dll" _
    (ByRef s As SHELLEXECUTEINFO) As Long

Then, all you need to do is declare an instance of the UDT, load it with the required information, and call the function.

Dim shInfo As SHELLEXECUTEINFO
 
    With shInfo
        .cbSize = LenB(shInfo)
        .lpFile = FullPathAndNameOfFile
        .nShow = SW_SHOW
        .fMask = SEE_MASK_INVOKEIDLIST
        .lpVerb = "properties"
    End With
 
    ShellExecuteExshInfo

If you try this for a file that does not exist, Windows pops up a message informing you of this fact. However, there is no runtime error.

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