----- Original Message ----- From: "Thomas Heller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <pythonce@python.org> Sent: Wednesday, January 11, 2006 3:42 PM Subject: Re: [PythonCE] How do you develop on the PocketPC?
> "Luke Dunstan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > >> ----- Original Message ----- >> From: "Thomas Heller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >> To: <pythonce@python.org> >> Sent: Monday, January 09, 2006 10:42 PM >> Subject: Re: [PythonCE] How do you develop on the PocketPC? >> >> I have noticed that IE works on the PDA when cradled, but I know that >> ActiveSync is not providing a real network adapter on the PC side >> because an extra IP does not appear in the output of 'ipconfig'. This >> prevents running TCP listen servers on the PDA but it is true that >> your method works nicely in this case. > > Luke, > > Do you know of any other way except TCP/IP to establish a two-way > communication between the desktop and the PDA? > > Thomas One way I know is using the CeRapiInvoke() API, which is a kind of remote procedure call: STDAPI_( HRESULT ) CeRapiInvoke( LPCWSTR pDllPath, LPCWSTR pFunctionName, DWORD cbInput, BYTE * pInput, DWORD * pcbOutput, BYTE ** ppOutput, IRAPIStream ** ppIRAPIStream, DWORD dwReserved ); You can specify a DLL and function name and the device-side part of RAPI will load the DLL and call the function, but it must have the following prototype (see also wincerapi.py): typedef HRESULT (STDAPICALLTYPE RAPIEXT)( DWORD cbInput, BYTE * pInput, DWORD * pcbOutput, BYTE ** ppOutput, IRAPIStream * pIRAPIStream ); In block mode (ppIRAPIStream == NULL) you can simply pass a block of data in each direction. The interesting part is that if you pass a pointer then you will receive a IRAPIStream* that allows the device and PC to communicate in both directions similar to a socket. I have tested this in one direction only using the CeInvoke sample from the Pocket PC 2003 SDK, and I also tested replacing the desktop-side program with a Python script. However, so far this API does not seem robust; for example if the device-side DLL releases the stream then IRAPIStream::Read() seems to block forever in the desktop program. The CeInvoke sample handles this by sending a command over the stream to let the desktop know that it has finished, but to my mind it is a hack because it would be like sending a disconnect command over a TCP socket and relying on that to shut down the other end. The function IRAPIStream::SetRapiStat can supposedly set a timeout for Read() but so far I can't get it to work. There is a two-way stream sample in an MSDN KB article that I have yet to try. For creating development tools there is also the possibility of using the Platform Manager APIs, which are installed and used by eMbedded Visual C++ to communicate with the remote debugger, among other things. Platform Manager supports multiple "transports" including TCP/IP and ActiveSync and you can even create your own transport. I haven't actually tried using it yet though :-). Luke _______________________________________________ PythonCE mailing list PythonCE@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/pythonce
