New topic: 

How useful? 'OLE Server' like cross platform functionality

<http://forums.realsoftware.com/viewtopic.php?t=36562>

         Page 1 of 1
   [ 1 post ]                 Previous topic | Next topic          Author  
Message        scarroll          Post subject: How useful? 'OLE Server' like 
cross platform functionalityPosted: Wed Dec 08, 2010 1:12 pm                    
     
Joined: Sat Apr 18, 2009 9:54 pm
Posts: 23                Recently I had to develop a project that needed to be 
a bit larger and more modular then my average RB app. Part of this involved 
porting a design from VB that used OLE Server Application functionality. The 
problem (aside from RB not being able to make ActiveX exes) was that I tried 
and found IPC a bit too low-level for what I needed and a third tier database 
design as a go between as too large for the project.  Has anyone here used REAL 
Software's IPC successfully or tried it and found it too limiting? 

I had some further issues with firewalls and sockets and gave up on IPC and 
networking too. I also needed some way to make the processes sync, as callbacks 
got messy. If you ever used VB, they had a classic 'coffee pot' demo of an OLE 
out-of-process server that had two VB apps talking to each other. One telling 
the other to create a window on demand. This could be used for modular 
expandable design, granted a new application is hefty compared to a library but 
RB doesn't compile DLLs, much less cross
platform ones. But with larger memory and multiple core CPUs more the norm 
these days, the benefits of out-of-process servers outweigh the drawbacks form 
building such modular albeit, slighty bigger projects. 

What I really needed was a cross platform OLE server like functionality and 
ended up rolling my own. I call it IPRO for Interprocess Remote Object and it 
works by using mutexes and introspection for serializing and syncing across 
applications. 

You use it by including either the IPROServer or the IPROClient class in your 
applications. These classes allow you to expose any other class or object in 
your application to another application. You can then control the remote object 
by invoking methods and get/set properties through the IPROClient class as a 
proxy to the object in another process. It doesn't support events yet, just 
public methods, and properties.

My question is, would this be useful to other developers as a commercial 
library? 

I'm suprised this isn't native to RB and have considered giving it away for 
free but would really like to fund renewing and upgrading my RB license. I am 
still on 2009r4. Has anyone made a buck or two selling RB classes? Does the 
encryption feature in RB2009 offer any real intellectual property protection? 
How much would such a library save you or would you be willing to spend on 
third party classes? $1, $99? I've seen a few plugins for sale with source for 
hundreds, but pure RB classes?

Any feedback greatly appreciated!!!   
                             Top            Display posts from previous: All 
posts1 day7 days2 weeks1 month3 months6 months1 year Sort by AuthorPost 
timeSubject AscendingDescending          Page 1 of 1
   [ 1 post ]      
-- 
Over 1500 classes with 29000 functions in one REALbasic plug-in collection. 
The Monkeybread Software Realbasic Plugin v9.3. 
http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/plugins.shtml

[email protected]

Reply via email to