Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help AT cygwin DOT com; run by ezmlm
List-Subscribe: <mailto:cygwin-subscribe AT cygwin DOT com>
List-Archive: <http://sources.redhat.com/ml/cygwin/>
List-Post: <mailto:cygwin AT cygwin DOT com>
List-Help: <mailto:cygwin-help AT cygwin DOT com>, <http://sources.redhat.com/ml/#faqs>
Sender: cygwin-owner AT cygwin DOT com
Mail-Followup-To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Delivered-To: mailing list cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Message-Id: <4.3.1.2.20021026211023.038e49c8@pop.rcn.com>
X-Sender: lhall AT pop DOT rcn DOT com
Date: Sat, 26 Oct 2002 21:34:01 -0400
To: <robert DOT calco AT verizon DOT net>, <cygwin AT cygwin DOT com>
From: "Larry Hall (RFK Partners, Inc)" <lhall AT rfk DOT com>
Subject: RE: COM Servers
In-Reply-To: <NCEJJNLDMEJLEJHKNGNHOEDLFAAA.robert.calco@verizon.net>
References: <4 DOT 3 DOT 1 DOT 2 DOT 20021026130348 DOT 038a4578 AT pop DOT rcn DOT com>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Understood.  You're right to be concerned about COM server implementations.
COM is very much driven by MS.  It's not too hard to be a COM client with 
gcc but if you want to build a COM server from scratch without MS tools,
you're going to have problems finding an IDL compiler and you may find issues
with ATL too (maybe not - I haven't tried though).  In terms of IDL
compilation and component programming, you may find more usable tools with
gcc if you switch to CORBA.  My guess is that counts out ActiveX though.
So if ActiveX is actually your goal here, you're likely stuck with MS all
around.  If the concepts of ActiveX and COM/ATL is your interest, then
CORBA and other alternatives lend themselves better to the gcc environment
and pretty much cover the same ideas.

Good luck,

Larry Hall                              lhall AT rfk DOT com
RFK Partners, Inc.                      http://www.rfk.com
838 Washington Street                   (508) 893-9779 - RFK Office
Holliston, MA 01746                     (508) 893-9889 - FAX



At 05:10 PM 10/26/2002, Bob Calco wrote:
>Larry:
>
>Thanks for your reply. :)
>
>What I'm trying to do is implement an ActiveX scripting engine for Ruby. I'd
>prefer to do it in Cygwin gcc since not everybody had the MS compiler. There
>other other capabilities that are implied: Compiling IDL files, linking to
>COM libraries, and ATL support. Something tells me that most folks who want
>to implement COM servers just bite the bullet and use the MS compiler,
>though. Then I'd have to compile Ruby itself in VCPP, and a MS-compiled
>version of Ruby would be mandatory to use my extension. I was hoping to
>avoid that.
>
>- Bob
>
>%% -----Original Message-----
>%% From: Larry Hall (RFK Partners, Inc) [mailto:lhall AT rfk DOT com]
>%% Sent: Saturday, October 26, 2002 1:23 PM
>%% To: robert DOT calco AT verizon DOT net; cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
>%% Subject: Re: COM Servers
>%%
>%%
>%% At 11:38 AM 10/25/2002, Bob Calco wrote:
>%% >Anyone:
>%% >
>%% >I've looked for information about building COM servers with
>%% Cygwin but a.)
>%% >the archive search tool crapped out on me when I attempted a
>%% search, and b.)
>%% >question doesn't appear on the FAQ list.
>%%
>%%
>%% Feel free to use google and point it at cygwin.com if you have
>%% problems with
>%% the Cygwin site's search engine.  This question only come up
>%% once in a blue
>%% moon so it doesn't really qualify as an FAQ.  It is in the email
>%% archives
>%% though.
>%%
>%%
>%% >So: Is it possible to build COM Servers using Cygwin? If so,
>%% are there any
>%% >tutorials or pointers to information about this?
>%%
>%%
>%%
>%% There's nothing that prevents you from working with COM.  It's the same
>%% as working with COM with the native Windows port of gcc.  Turns out that
>%% COM is a very difficult thing to search for and get useful
>%% information about,
>%% since the acronym is so common (every email message contains
>%% ".com" so just
>%% searching for that gets you everything! ;-) )  Sorry, I don't
>%% have specific
>%% suggestions for you here other than to note that the general subject has
>%% been discussed before on the email list and that it should be
>%% possible to
>%% COM using gcc and Cygwin.  There's probably some newsgroup or other
>%% forum out there that discusses gcc and COM too, if you feel like poking
>%% around looking for it.
>%%
>%% Good luck,
>%%
>%%
>%%
>%% Larry Hall                              lhall AT rfk DOT com
>%% RFK Partners, Inc.                      http://www.rfk.com
>%% 838 Washington Street                   (508) 893-9779 - RFK Office
>%% Holliston, MA 01746                     (508) 893-9889 - FAX
>%%
>%%
>
>
>
>--
>Unsubscribe info:      http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple
>Bug reporting:         http://cygwin.com/bugs.html
>Documentation:         http://cygwin.com/docs.html
>FAQ:                   http://cygwin.com/faq/


--
Unsubscribe info:      http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple
Bug reporting:         http://cygwin.com/bugs.html
Documentation:         http://cygwin.com/docs.html
FAQ:                   http://cygwin.com/faq/