Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I've had a client request, and I
want to know how to approach the problem.

I want something to appear on our (intranet HTML) app that interacts
with the local environment of the PC running the app.

1) Is an ActiveX control the thing I want to place on the page.
2) Can anyone point me at good primers for developing ActiveX VB
Controls ?

I am not a very experienced VB programmer (lots of other odd
languages, but I tend usually not to get too 'under the hood' with
windoze).

More specifically - some kind of button is required on a page that
will a) scrape a phone number off the page (Shouldn't be *too* hard)
and b) locally use that phone number to dial the telephone plugged
into the users modem socket.

I know b) can be done somehow, as some contact managers do it (see
next post ...), but the a) bit is foxing me.

Primers, advice, snippets gratefully received.

David.