need some advice in creating a plug-in type architecture fro windows app

[milsnips]

Hi there,

I would like some advice in how to go about creating a plug-in type
windows form architecture, this is what i had in mind:

a form similar to windows explorer with the grouped navigation items
on the left, each group in the left nav section will represent a plug-
in application with its related options, and when a user clicks on it,
the application will load up in the right hand side of that form.

Now, what i had in mind was something like having a monitored folder,
and when a DLL is dropped in, it will try to load it up, and if it is
a valid application plug-in, it will retrieve the grouped nav options
and load them up in the container window, i guess the entire
application would need to be stored either in 1 DLL or each
application could have its own "initializer" dll, which points to the
sub folder of its application.

Any thoughts on this and feedback would be greatly appreciated?
thanks.
Paul.

 

[Guest]

Hi Paul,

I think you can achive this using reflection services of .net framefork.
Each plug-in application should be in form of a DLL which will be loaded at
runtime by winform application.

Reflection services allows you to load dll and callmethods in it as well as
it also allows you to see what methods are there in it with parameters and
how to call them.

 

[Michael C]

Hi Paul,

I think you can achive this using reflection services of .net framefork.
Each plug-in application should be in form of a DLL which will be loaded
at
runtime by winform application.

Reflection services allows you to load dll and callmethods in it as well
as
it also allows you to see what methods are there in it with parameters and
how to call them.

Generally for addin you would know the methods beforehand. The OP could
create a dll with interfaces. The addin author could then reference this dll
and implement the required interfaces.

Michael