Access JADE functionality from .NET applications

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by John Munro >> Tue, 24 Jun 2008 19:27:25 GMT

Tha JADE Roadmap (http://www.jadeworld.com/downloads/jade ... oadmap.pdf) says that in 6.2 we can access JADE functionality from .NET applications:

"COM exposure capabilities have been enhanced in JADE 6.2 to provide Primary Interop Assemblies (PIAs) in addition to the COM interface. The PIAs allow JADE functionality to be integrated with .NET applications."

I can't find any reference to Primary Interop Assemblies in the JADE 6.2 help files - did this feature not make it into 6.2 after all?

John

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by Dean Cooper >> Thu, 26 Jun 2008 0:48:58 GMT

Apologies - that paragraph should have been removed from the Roadmap. We will correct the PDF on our web site.

However, there is a workaround. COM exposure is sometimes referred to as ActiveX exposure. Basically a developer 'exposes' a set of classes, methods, properties, etc that can be accessed via COM (ActiveX) from another application. JADE provides a Visual Studio 6.0 Wizard that uses the exposure definition and builds a COM server (either in-process [a DLL] or out-of-process [an EXE]). This COM server provides "fat client" style access to JADE. A PIA is a .NET assembly that wraps around a COM object, therefore enabling a .NET application to use ActiveX components. So a PIA can be generated for the ActiveX exposure DLL created by JADE's VS6 Wizard, which should allow a .NET application to access JADE.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa302338.aspx provides information about PIAs and how to build them.

The C# API in JADE 6.3 will make this kind of .NET-to-JADE interoperability a whole lot easier

Dean.

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by John Munro >> Thu, 26 Jun 2008 2:12:34 GMT

Thanks for the information.

Does the ActiveX exposure still only work with VS6? (see contact #39365) VS6 is 10 years old, I don't think they sell it anymore

Will the .NET-to-JADE interoperability in 6.3 be limited to C#? I prefer working in VB.NET...

John

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by Dean Cooper >> Mon, 30 Jun 2008 10:52:20 GMT

Yes, the ActiveX exposure wizard is still only VS6 and we have no plans at the moment to upgrade it. We're concentrating our development resources right now on the C# API.

And yes, once you've defined what you want to expose and imported the JADE-generated C# classes into .NET, you will be able to program to them from VB.NET and any other .NET language.

Dean.