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A plug-in framework provides a standard mechanism for developing application that need to be easily evolved and customized. For example, you might want to developa commercial application for different
audiance levels/versions (say Standard, Professional, and Enterprise). Instead of mantaining 3 separate code bases for the different versions, you can simply create a single shell/host application that incorporates the
features avaible for each version as incremental plug-ins. Using this idea, the Standard version will have the host application + standard plug-ins, the Professional version will have the host application + standard +
professional plug-ins, and the Enterprise version will have the host application + standard + professional + enterprise plug-ins. Another reason to use plug-ins is to allow your clients to create customized
sub-modules that plug in to your (host) application. This is very common for utility applications such as operating systems or operating system shells. For instance, the Win32 shell provide a slew of APIs and COM
interfaces that allow you to write your own shell extensions or shell plug-ins.Incidentally, Borland Packages is a perfect solution for implementing plug-in frameworks. This is made possible because of Borland
Packges's binary interoperability aspect. In simple terms, you can use package to create a framework consisting of host and plug-in applications, possibly written in different Borland languages (Delphi, Builder), and be
able to have them all work together seamlessly. Download ADK sorce code |
