path: root/doc/dde.n

'\"
'\" Copyright (c) 1997 Sun Microsystems, Inc.
'\" Copyright (c) 2001 ActiveState Corporation.
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'\" RCS: @(#) $Id: dde.n,v 1.23 2007/12/13 15:22:32 dgp Exp $
'\" 
.so man.macros
.TH dde n 1.3 dde "Tcl Bundled Packages"
.BS
'\" Note:  do not modify the .SH NAME line immediately below!
.SH NAME
dde \- Execute a Dynamic Data Exchange command
.SH SYNOPSIS
.sp
\fBpackage require dde 1.3\fR
.sp
\fBdde servername\fR ?\fB\-force\fR? ?\fB\-handler \fIproc\fR? ?\fB\-\|\-\fR? ?\fItopic\fR?
.sp
\fBdde execute\fR ?\fB\-async\fR? \fIservice topic data\fR
.sp
\fBdde poke\fR \fIservice topic item data\fR
.sp
\fBdde request\fR ?\fB\-binary\fR? \fIservice topic item\fR
.sp
\fBdde services \fIservice topic\fR
.sp
\fBdde eval\fR ?\fB\-async\fR? \fItopic cmd \fR?\fIarg arg ...\fR?
.BE

.SH DESCRIPTION
.PP
This command allows an application to send Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)
command when running under Microsoft Windows. Dynamic Data Exchange is
a mechanism where applications can exchange raw data. Each DDE
transaction needs a \fIservice name\fR and a \fItopic\fR. Both the
\fIservice name\fR and \fItopic\fR are application defined; Tcl uses
the service name \fBTclEval\fR, while the topic name is the name of the
interpreter given by \fBdde servername\fR. Other applications have their
own \fIservice names\fR and \fItopics\fR. For instance, Microsoft Excel
has the service name \fBExcel\fR.
.PP
.SH "DDE COMMANDS"
.PP
The following commands are a subset of the full Dynamic Data Exchange
set of commands.
.TP
\fBdde servername \fR?\fB\-force\fR? ?\fB\-handler \fIproc\fR? ?\fB\-\|\-\fR? ?\fItopic\fR?
\fBdde servername\fR registers the interpreter as a DDE server with
the service name \fBTclEval\fR and the topic name specified by \fItopic\fR.
If no \fItopic\fR is given, \fBdde servername\fR returns the name
of the current topic or the empty string if it is not registered as a
service. If the given \fItopic\fR name is already in use, then a
suffix of the form
.QW " #2"
or
.QW " #3"
is appended to the name to make it
unique. The command's result will be the name actually used. The
\fB\-force\fR option is used to force registration of precisely the
given \fItopic\fR name.
.IP
The \fB\-handler\fR option specifies a Tcl procedure that will be called to
process calls to the dde server. If the package has been loaded into a
safe interpreter then a \fB\-handler\fR procedure must be defined. The
procedure is called with all the arguments provided by the remote
call.
.TP
\fBdde execute\fR ?\fB\-async\fR? \fIservice topic data\fR
\fBdde execute\fR takes the \fIdata\fR and sends it to the server indicated
by \fIservice\fR with the topic indicated by \fItopic\fR. Typically,
\fIservice\fR is the name of an application, and \fItopic\fR is a file to
work on.  The \fIdata\fR field is given to the remote application.
Typically, the application treats the \fIdata\fR field as a script, and the
script is run in the application.  The \fB\-async\fR option requests
asynchronous invocation.  The command returns an error message if the
script did not run, unless the \fB\-async\fR flag was used, in which case
the command returns immediately with no error.
.TP
\fBdde poke \fIservice topic item data\fR
\fBdde poke\fR passes the \fIdata\fR to the server indicated by
\fIservice\fR using the \fItopic\fR and \fIitem\fR specified.  Typically,
\fIservice\fR is the name of an application.  \fItopic\fR is application
specific but can be a command to the server or the name of a file to work
on.  The \fIitem\fR is also application specific and is often not used, but
it must always be non-null.  The \fIdata\fR field is given to the remote
application.
.TP
\fBdde request\fR ?\fB\-binary\fR? \fIservice topic item\fR
\fBdde request\fR is typically used to get the value of something; the
value of a cell in Microsoft Excel or the text of a selection in
Microsoft Word. \fIservice\fR is typically the name of an application,
\fItopic\fR is typically the name of the file, and \fIitem\fR is
application-specific. The command returns the value of \fIitem\fR as
defined in the application.  Normally this is interpreted to be a
string with terminating null.  If \fB\-binary\fR is specified, the
result is returned as a byte array.
.TP
\fBdde services \fIservice topic\fR
\fBdde services\fR returns a list of service-topic pairs that
currently exist on the machine. If \fIservice\fR and \fItopic\fR are
both empty strings ({}), then all service-topic pairs currently
available on the system are returned. If \fIservice\fR is empty and
\fItopic\fR is not, then all services with the specified topic are
returned. If \fIservice\fR is non-empty and \fItopic\fR is, all topics
for a given service are returned. If both are non-empty, if that
service-topic pair currently exists, it is returned; otherwise, an
empty string is returned.
.TP
\fBdde eval\fR ?\fB\-async\fR? \fItopic cmd \fR?\fIarg arg ...\fR?
\fBdde eval\fR evaluates a command and its arguments using the interpreter
specified by \fItopic\fR. The DDE service must be the \fBTclEval\fR
service.  The \fB\-async\fR option requests asynchronous invocation.  The
command returns an error message if the script did not run, unless the
\fB\-async\fR flag was used, in which case the command returns immediately
with no error.  This command can be used to replace send on Windows.
.SH "DDE AND TCL"
A Tcl interpreter always has a service name of \fBTclEval\fR.  Each
different interpreter of all running Tcl applications must be
given a unique
name specified by \fBdde servername\fR. Each interp is available as a
DDE topic only if the \fBdde servername\fR command was used to set the
name of the topic for each interp. So a \fBdde services TclEval {}\fR
command will return a list of service-topic pairs, where each of the
currently running interps will be a topic.
.PP
When Tcl processes a \fBdde execute\fR command, the data for the
execute is run as a script in the interp named by the topic of the
\fBdde execute\fR command.
.PP
When Tcl processes a \fBdde request\fR command, it returns the value of the
variable given in the dde command in the context of the interp named by the
dde topic. Tcl reserves the variable \fB$TCLEVAL$EXECUTE$RESULT\fR for
internal use, and \fBdde request\fR commands for that variable will give
unpredictable results.
.PP
An external application which wishes to run a script in Tcl should have
that script store its result in a variable, run the \fBdde execute\fR
command, and the run \fBdde request\fR to get the value of the
variable.
.PP
When using DDE, be careful to ensure that the event queue is flushed
using either \fBupdate\fR or \fBvwait\fR.  This happens by default
when using \fBwish\fR unless a blocking command is called (such as \fBexec\fR
without adding the \fB&\fR to place the process in the background).
If for any reason the event queue is not flushed, DDE commands may
hang until the event queue is flushed.  This can create a deadlock
situation.
.SH EXAMPLE
This asks Internet Explorer (which must already be running) to go to a
particularly important website:
.CS
package require dde
\fBdde execute\fR iexplore WWW_OpenURL http://www.tcl.tk/
.CE

.SH "SEE ALSO"
tk(n), winfo(n), send(n)

.SH KEYWORDS
application, dde, name, remote execution