WINDEV Concepts

Part 2: Development environment 73 External component in practice 1 Overview 1.1 Definition An external component is a set of WINDEV, WEBDEV or WINDEV Mobile elements: windows, pages, reports, analysis, etc. This set of elements performs a specific operation. For example, a component can correspond to one of the following features: • Sending faxes, • Sending emails, • ... Remarks : • To optimize the organization of your projects, you can use internal components. For more details, see Internal components in practice. • In this chapter, we will refer to "external component" as "component". An external component can be redistributed to other WINDEV, WEBDEV or WINDEV Mobile developers (free of charge or not). These developers will be able to easily integrate the feature included in the component into their application (or site). The component will therefore be integrated into and distributed with the application (or site). When creating the external component, the author specifies: • which elements in the component are visible to the user. Visible elements will be accessible programmatically, or via the "Project explorer" pane. • how to use the component (use mode, the parameters used to access the component functionalities, etc.). A short documentation (to be completed) is automatically generated and associated with the component. Remark : WINDEV includes several examples of components. These components can be imported via the "Project" tab of the editor: on the "Import" tab, in the "Project" group, expand "Project" and select "An External component .. Utility component or example". You can open the corresponding projects from the WINDEV home page (Ctrl + <). 1.2 What is an external component com- posed of? An external component can be: • defined and generated from an existing WINDEV, WEBDEV or WINDEV Mobile project. A "Component" project configuration will allow you to select the elements of the existing project to be integrated into the component. • created from an "External component" project. By default, this project is composed of an "External component" platform which will contain the elements required to create and generate the component. This external component can then be integrated into other WINDEV, WEBDEV or WINDEV Mobile projects. All the elements of the component are totally independent of the project in which it is integrated. The external component can have its own analysis, windows, reports, data files, etc. When generating the external component, simply specify if the project that uses the component will access these elements. The project will not be able to read or manipulate elements that are not accessible. The external component consists of several files: <Component name>.WDK Component file . Contains all the elements of the external component. This file is required to include the external component in a project. This file must also be provided in the client version of the application that uses the external component. <Component name>.WDI Component description (when developing applications only). This file is required to include the external component in a project. This file must not be provided in the client version of the application that uses the external component.