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COM IDL and Interface Design First Edition

by Al Major (Author)
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 5 ratings
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What is the Subject Area?

The Interface Definition Language (IDL) provides a way of describing COM interfaces that doesn't depend on any other programming language. As such, it is currently the best and most generic means available for expressing your interface and object designs. More than that though, IDL is fundamental to the generation of the type libraries that are becoming pervasive within the COM architecture, and the marshaling code that enables COM remote procedure calls. Well-written IDL can enhance the performance of your COM components --- it's just too important to be left to the Wizards.

This book clearly explains the syntax and usage of IDL, but that's only the beginning of the story. You'll also learn how to write efficient interfaces in a way that facilitates their use from languages other than C++. You'll also get a comprehensive (over 40) list of interface and object design techniques and guidelines that shorten your design learning curve and pay for the price of the book.

The book places all of this in context by demonstrating C++/ATL code that implements an On-Line Auction. You'll see sophisticated COM techniques, such as Alternate Identity, Delayed Initialization, Split Identity, multiple scriptable IDispatch interfaces, persistence delegation, marshaling structures with embedded pointers, using IMallocSpy, etc.

The code is very far from being an academic exercise! The application functionality is realistic and the examples demonstrate how to build COM Object Models that work with cutting-edge technologies such as OLE-DB, DHTML controls, STL collections, etc. The architecture and interfaces are carefully designed to be used from any programming language and the book proves this! The COM client bindings chapter shows you how to build exactly the same front end to the Auction Server in VB, Java, C++/MFC, DHTML/VBScript and DHTML/JScript!

What's Great About this Book?

- Explains the syntax and features of the Interface Definition Language.
- Analyzes the issues surrounding COM marshaling and memory management.
- Teaches how to design your interfaces to be used from any client language.
- Examines common IDL programming pitfalls.
- Describes how COM types, interface and interface protocols bind to
the different client languages.
- Shows you how to design your application for maximum portability.
- Implements a realistic COM application with a fully-featured object model.

Who is this Book for?

This title is aimed primarily at C++ developers with a working knowledge of COM and ATL who want to improve the efficiency of their interfaces and make using them from client languages as intuitive as possible.

Its focus on interface programming should also make it valuable to experienced developers (including CORBA programmers) who are interested in learning about COM style Interface Programming. Because of the way it treats the design of COM object models, it should also prove helpful to architects and project leads who are responsible for implementation of object oriented systems that use the COM infrastructure.

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Previous page
  1. ISBN-10
    1861002254
  2. ISBN-13
    978-1861002259
  3. Edition
    First Edition
  4. Publisher
    Apress
  5. Publication date
    February 1, 1999
  6. Language
    English
  7. Dimensions
    7.5 x 1 x 9.25 inches
  8. Print length
    437 pages
  9. See all details
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Amazon First Reads | Editors' picks at exclusive prices

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

An expert-mode guide to the inner workings of the Distributed Component Object Model (DCOM), COM IDL and Interface Design also provides some excellent sample code for objects that are useful for an e-commerce Web site. The author argues that you can design with Interactive Data Language (IDL) manually and then write the code behind it in C++, Visual Basic, or Java.

The book begins with a quick tour of Component Object Model (COM) basics, including interface diagrams and dual interfaces (used for scripting COM objects in VB). Next comes material on remote method calls and DCOM, including some excellent material on apartment models and marshalling. There is a thorough guide to all IDL data types, whether basic types, arrays, references, and pointers or VB automation data types (such as BSTRs and Variants). A chapter on application design displays the author's considerable knowledge of COM and software patterns.

The heart of this book is the author's case study of COM objects needed for an electronic auction Web site. After walking through the design process, the author creates all the relevant COM objects in IDL. Next he shows client-side test programs written in Visual Basic, Visual J++, Visual C++ (and Microsoft Foundation Class [MFC]), VBScript, and JavaScript. The last part of the book builds the server-side objects (based on his IDL) in C++ using the leading-edge ActiveX Template Library (ATL) for fast performance. The author gives you everything you need here including several custom extensions to ATL.

Filled with expert knowledge, COM IDL and Interface Design turns out to be one of the best available guides for advanced development with distributed objects in DCOM on the Microsoft platform. --Richard Dragan

From the Publisher

What's Great About this Book?

- Explains the syntax and features of the Interface Definition Language.
- Analyzes the issues surrounding COM marshaling and memory management.
- Teaches how to design your interfaces to be used from any client language.
- Examines common IDL programming pitfalls.
- Describes how COM types, interface and interface protocols bind to
the different client languages.
- Shows you how to design your application for maximum portability.
- Implements a realistic COM application with a fully-featured object model.

Who is this Book for?

The primary audience of the book is the professional developer who is using C++ / ATL to build sophisticated COM object models.

However, developers in other languages can pick up the most important concepts of COM style interface-based programming. Architects and project leads working on COM object models can benefit from much of the language-independent material in the book. In addition, the experienced CORBA programmer looking for a quick intro into COM style interface design will find this a great read.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Apress; First Edition (February 1, 1999)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 437 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1861002254
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1861002259
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.62 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.5 x 1 x 9.25 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 5 ratings

About the author

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Al Major

Al Major

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Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
4.2 out of 5
5 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars this is the book to write COM, starting from the data model
Reviewed in the United States on April 28, 2002
This book is a bottom up approach to COM, which starts from the IDL, but then goes through all the marshalling mechanisms, remote method calls, etc. About Mid-book Dr. Major presents an application design model which starts from the interfaces. The book will prove useful to those who want to design COM classes and interfaces that know how to behave based on whether they are local or remote, in-proc or out of proc and in general are better adapted to their environment.
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Seattle Doug
2.0 out of 5 stars Some useful information, but not as complete as expected.
Reviewed in the United States on August 7, 2000
I bought this book having grasped the basics of COM and IDL and expecting it to help me improve my designs and better understand the issues in how to develop a "good" COM interface.
I found to be mostly disappointing from a design standpoint. Many issues which six months later I had learned were really very important (e.g. the vital question of whether to support IDispatch or not and the huge performance penalty in MFC's default use of this interface) were not covered. There are many trade-offs in COM and I found little discussion of them here.
As a reference it has potential, since it is thorough and deep, but as other reviews have mentioned, it's not as easy to use as a reference as it perhaps should be.
In the end, it's been sitting on my shelf largely untouched as other ATL and COM books become dog-eared with use. So from me, it's thumbs down.
8 people found this helpful
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DJ M
4.0 out of 5 stars COM IDL? Its all in here
Reviewed in the United States on July 18, 2000
This is definitely the COM IDL reference book. There aren't many books devoted to the subject and most COM books focus on the technology from a specific language perspective not spending any time on IDL itself. Frankly I can't say that it has helped me a great deal with everyday development but it certainly has made my understanding of a few things much clearer and it has reinforced some ideas I had that I was not sure of. Like other reviewers I did not find the other half of the book to be of great value but it was interesting to compare (partial) implementations of the same design in 5 different languages in the same book. My final praise is on the excellent comparison of the various IDL types and how they map to the various languages including a discussion/description of the ubiquitous SAFEARRAY.
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J. Kohn
4.0 out of 5 stars Good book, especially as an IDL reference
Reviewed in the United States on April 7, 2000
Some of the more esoteric stuff in the second half of the book wasn't as useful to me since I pretty much develop standard dual-interface components, but the first half covering IDL and marshalling was extremely good.
2 people found this helpful
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