As far as I know, you need to have an external copy of the VCX. Files contained within EXEs (or APPs) are visible within the context of the EXE or APP, but not outside of the EXE (or APP) -- meaning that an SCX outside of the EXE can't see the VCX inside the EXE. I haven't checked to see if CREATEOBJECT() would work outside of an EXE where the class being accessed is defined in a VCX contained within the EXE. I do know however that classes defined programmatically with DEFINE CLASS in PRGs compiled into an EXE *are* available outside EXE -- as long as the class definition exists in a PRG context within the call stack or is made available through SET PROCEDURE.