MouseEvent.ToString Property

Returns a string that represents the properties of a KeyboardEvent or MouseEvent object. Read-only.

Version Information
 Version Added:  Visio 2003

Syntax

expression.ToString

expression   A variable that represents a MouseEvent object.

Return Value
String

Remarks

ToString is the default property of both KeyboardEvent and MouseEvent objects.

When a KeyDown, KeyPress, or KeyUp event fires, the ToString property returns a string that represents the properties of the KeyboardEvent object that gets passed to VisEventProc. The string has the following form:

event code; KeyCode property value; KeyButtonState property value; KeyAscii property value; Window.Caption

where event code returns the code of the event that fired and Window.Caption returns the caption of the window that sourced the event. For example, if a user pressed the "L" key while holding down the SHIFT key, in response to the KeyPress event, ToString might return

713;0;4;76;Drawing1

When a MouseDown, MouseMove, or MouseUp event fires, the ToString property returns a string that represents the properties of the MouseEvent object that gets passed to VisEventProc. The string has the following form:

event code; Button property value; KeyButtonState property value; x property value; y property value; Window.Caption

where event code returns the code of the event that fired and Window.Caption returns the caption of the window that sourced the event. For example, if a user clicked the left mouse button near the middle of the drawing page while holding down the SHIFT key, in response to the MouseDown event, ToString might return

709;1;5;4.3750003+000;4.265000+000;Drawing1

For more information about the possible values returned by each of the individual properties represented by the string returned by ToString, see the respective property topics in this Automation Reference.

Example

The following Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) example shows how to use the AddAdvise method to create a Event object that will sink a MouseDown event. It uses the ToString property of the MouseEvent object to report the details of the event that fired.

The example contains a class module and two public procedures that are inserted into the ThisDocument project of the active Visio document:

• The CreateEventObject procedure creates an instance of a sink-object (event-handling) class named clsEventSink that gets passed to the AddAdvise method, and that receives notifications of events. In addition, the procedure creates an Event object to send notifications of firings of the MouseDown event sourced by the Application object to the sink object.
• The DeleteEventObject procedure deletes this Event object when your program is finished using it.

The clsEventSink class implements the IVisEventProc interface. The class module creates a class to handle events fired by the Visio Application object. The module consists of the function VisEventProc, which uses a Select Case block to check for the MouseDown event. When a MouseDown event fires, Visio passes a MouseEvent object to VisEventProc as pSubjectObj. The function then constructs a message that displays the string returned by the ToString property of the MouseEvent object passed to the function.

Other events fall under the default case (Case Else). The Case Else block constructs a string (strMessage) that contains the name and event code of the event that fired. Finally, the function displays the string in the Immediate window.

The example assumes that there is an active document in the Visio application window. Copy the following code into the ThisDocument project in the Visual Basic Editor:

  Option Explicit
Private mEventSink As clsEventSink
'Declare visEvtAdd as a 2-byte value
'to avoid a run-time overflow error
Private Const visEvtAdd% = &H8000
Public Sub CreateMouseDownEventObject()
Dim vsoApplicationEvents As Visio.EventList				
Dim vsoMouseDownEvent As Visio.Event				

'Create an instance of the clsEventSink class
'to pass to the AddAdvise method.
Set mEventSink = New clsEventSink

'Get the EventList collection of the application
Set vsoApplicationEvents = Application.EventList 

'Add an Event object for the MouseDown event
'that will send notifications.
Set vsoMouseDownEvent= vsoApplicationEvents.AddAdvise( _ 
   visEvtCodeMouseDown, mEventSink, "", "Mouse down...") 

End Sub
Public Sub DeleteMouseDownEventObject()
'Delete the Event object for the MouseDown event  
vsoMouseDownEvent.Delete 
Set vsoMouseDownEvent = Nothing    

End Sub

Copy the following code into a new class module in VBA, naming the module clsEventSink.

  Implements Visio.IVisEventProc 
Private Function IVisEventProc_VisEventProc( _
ByVal nEventCode As Integer, _
ByVal pSourceObj As Object, _
ByVal nEventID As Long, _
ByVal nEventSeqNum As Long, _
ByVal pSubjectObj As Object, _
ByVal vMoreInfo As Variant) As Variant
Dim strMessage As String
Dim vsoMouseDownEvent As Visio.MouseEvent

'Find out which event fired
Select Case nEventCode 
    Case visEvtCodeMouseDown
        Set vsoMouseEvent = pSubjectObj
        strMessage = "ToString is: "  &  vsoMouseEvent.ToString
    Case Else 
        strMessage = "Other (" & nEventCode & ")" 
End Select

'Display the event name and the event code
Debug.Print strMessage 

End Function

See Also

• MouseEvent Object
• MouseEvent Object Members