sharing results between 4 programs

[gromit]

Hi All

Bit of advise please

I have three stand alone programs
I have written a 4th I have Called Launcher
As the name infers this runs the three progs

Hyperthetical EXample
Prog 1 contacts details name address etc struct contact { }

Prog 2 List of Contacts wants and needs struct needs { }

prog 3 my own written Parts Database from which to choose conrtacts wants and needs  struct parts{ }

each program gives me the results i need

Each prog writes its results to a seperate Text file.

Each program closes  after the text file is written.

Then Launcher reads the text files and puts the data in the order in which i need it

Amount of data never really exceeds more than 2 k

Considering i end up with
contact details

Contact wants and needs

List of Contact wants and needs

Price of that list

What alternative Method would you use to  go about collecting this data from these three programs ?

[frankie]

Take a look to Interprocess communication methods
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms905817.aspx
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/34073/Inter-Process-Communication-IPC-Introduction-and-S

[CommonTater]

Hi Gromit ...

Love your .sig btw...

How much control do you have over each program?  As in... do you have source code?

I would first look into amalgamating them into one app since they all work to a common output.
If that was not possible I would look at designing a common data base for them all to access.
Finally I wold look at Frankie's suggestion.

If you don't have the source... then neither my nor Frankie's suggestions are of much use to you.


( Hi Frankie   )

[gromit]

Big Thanks Frankie and Tater

I dearly needed some input on what i am doing as i want to expand the the seperate apps to about 7 .
I looked at inter communication. A bit beyond me at present and seems too big a spanner to crack a small nut.

I have written all 4 apps  in question ..

As they currently serve seperately and give me much needed and fast lookup info in stand alone mode

I think i will continue to run them seperately.

Collecting the data as stated earlier when in mixed mode

Big thanks for the advice.





 

[CommonTater]

Big Thanks Frankie and Tater

I dearly needed some input on what i am doing as i want to expand the the seperate apps to about 7 .
I looked at inter communication. A bit beyond me at present and seems too big a spanner to crack a small nut.

I have written all 4 apps  in question ..

As they currently serve seperately and give me much needed and fast lookup info in stand alone mode

I think i will continue to run them seperately.

Collecting the data as stated earlier when in mixed mode

Big thanks for the advice.

At the very least, design a common fileset for all to work with then add links to let each one launch the next in the sequence...

For example:  Contacts, Parts, Orders... all with an agreed structure.  At least then you can have each ap writing files the other aps intrinsically understand... So when you get an order (for example) you can open all three files to compose an invoice...

[gromit]

Almost ahead of you here i have already decided that as i call my apps from a main Launcher app i was already considering having a situation where i have an Auto Button which will set all apps in motion opening and closing down sequentialy and passing the data via the text files that store it.

Currently the same thing happens via me tapping a seperate button that runs each app.
As i have more apps to add to this suite i will do that and give each app the ability to run in Auto Mode.
This was what i decided after taking yours and frankies advice.
So once Again Big Thanks Gromit.

The major reason for breaking the whole thing down to smaller apps is because i am running it on del axim pda .
Memory i feel will become pushed with them all running together

[CommonTater]

The major reason for breaking the whole thing down to smaller apps is because i am running it on del axim pda .
Memory i feel will become pushed with them all running together

Maybe not so much as you think ... consider what all the apps have in common ... ui, message handling, user i/o. file i/o, etc.  Combining them may actually make the overall big app quite a bit smaller than the sum of the separate ones. 

I maintain a rather narly Inventory app that I wrote years ago.  It began as a set of separate apps... then one day I did some checking and discovered that I could combine two of the proggys by simply writing one function into one of them.  Over time I've combined it down to a single app that, while way too big for a pda does run in fairly modest desktops with no problem at all.

Not to twist your arm, of course, but maybe you should at least give it some serious consideration... Look at how much duplication there is between them and then try to estimate the overall size of a single app... you might be pleasantly surprised.

[Bitbeisser]

The major reason for breaking the whole thing down to smaller apps is because i am running it on del axim pda .
Memory i feel will become pushed with them all running together

Maybe not so much as you think ... consider what all the apps have in common ... ui, message handling, user i/o. file i/o, etc.  Combining them may actually make the overall big app quite a bit smaller than the sum of the separate ones. 

The issue is likely not the file size of the single combined executable but the amount of RAM used while running it.

Please consider that this is something running in Windows CE on a Pocket PC, not something on a regular Windows box! There are far more restrictive conditions...

Ralf

[CommonTater]

Hi Ralf ... it was only a suggestion... sometimes it pays to investigate the unlikley.

He said in his first message he's working with about 2k of data... do the real problem would be run time memory, which might surprise him if combined...

Or, maybe not...

[melsaxing]

thanks for the advice