OLE controls are similar to VA Smalltalk parts. They are self-contained objects that can be simple, such as buttons and entry fields, or complex, such as spreadsheets and text editors.

OLE controls are contained in library files with an .ocx extension. Each file contains one or more controls. Each OLE control has properties, methods, or events which customize the appearance and behavior of the control. When you import an OLE control into VA Smalltalk, you can choose which of these properties, methods, or events you want to make available as VA Smalltalk attributes, events, or actions.