Winforms WebBrowser fails on vista.

Question

I have a simple winforms app just one window with one WebBrowser control inside. On vista this fails to show the date but works OK XP ? The website runs activeX to show the date.

namespace WindowsFormsBrowserTest
{
    public partial class Form1 : Form
    {
        public Form1()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
            this.webBrowser1.Navigate("http://www.pcpitstop.com/testax.asp");
        }
    }
}

http://www.pcpitstop.com/testax.asp

Any clues would be really spreciated, should be simple but I have no idea.

Any security experts out there ?

Answer 1

Can you view the website properly in Internet Explorer on Vista when it fails? I know when I visit that website I get asked to install an ActiveX control. The WebBrowser control won't handle the installation of the ActiveX control for you.

Answer 2

In Internet Explorer on your Vista machine, go to "Internet options", "Security" tab page. You will see an option "Enable protected mode". Turn it off... :-)

(This option doesn't exist on XP and other Windows versions.)

Answer 3

I have eventually sorted this issue out. One web page caused exceptions.

The application was hosting a web page running an activeX control.

Turned off Data Execution Prevention "DEP" for the application with a post build step.

All working fine now.