Overview of COM
What is COM? | How is it used? | COM servers and clients | Different types of COM servers | Type libraries |COM Objects with type libraries | Automation objects
Interfaces
Interfaces as a language feature | Benefits of Interfaces | Working with Interface variables rather than objects | Reference counting and memory management | IUnknown, IDispatch, IProvideClassInfo | Classes which implement interfaces | TinterfacedObject, | Inheritance and Interfaces | Interface } Iheritance | GUIDs | Aggregation and Implements
Working with Existing COM servers
MS-Word and MS-Excel | Automation using variants | CreateOLEObject | Named and positional parameters | Automation using type libraries | Mail merge, spell checking, and charting | COM & The Registry · Structure of keys for registered servers e.g. Word, Excel | Finding registered servers | More examples of COM | ADO | ActiveX | MTS
Writing your own COM servers
Types of COM servers | Interfaces, Classes, and server types | IUnknown, IDispatch, IProvideClassInfo | TinterfacedObject, TComObject, TTypedComObject, TAutoObject | CoClasses & COM Objects | Instancing | Interface Typecasting and Extracting Interfaces | SafeCall Calling Convention | Threading Models
Type Libraries and Automation
Contents Of Type Libraries | Uses Of Type Libraries | The Type Library Editor | Creating An Automation Object | Controlling An Automation Object From other packages | Dispatch Interfaces | Automation Data Types | Dual Interfaces, IDispatch and IDispatch.Invoke
Microsoft Transaction Server
·MTS Overview | Microsoft Management Console | Creating MTS Objects | Using MTS Explorer | Creating MTS Packages
