How can you pass a variable from one addin to another using vb.net

[davidm]

I've used vb.net to write two separate addins.  I was wondering if there is a way to pass a variable from one addin to another similar to the way shared variables are passed from rule to rule in iLogic.

[ekinsb · Accepted solution]

It's not as simple as a shared variable but the two add-ins are distinct programs and don't share anything.  However there are potentially a couple of solutions for passing information between two add-ins.

The first is for one add-in to write information into a location that the second add-in has access to.  For example, you could create an iProperty on a document or create an attribute.  The problem with this approach is all of the locations where you can write custom data are in documents so the second add-in would have to know which document to look in and you would be dirtying the document which could be confusing to the user.

The second approach is that an add-in can support it's own custom API.  For example, one of your add-ins could support a public method called SetValue and the other add-in can find the first add-in and call this method, passing it the value.

A third approach I just thought of is to write the information to a file on disk.  This is similar to the first solution but has the advantage that it's not editing anything in Inventor.  It would also be simpler to implement.

[davidm]

Thank you for replying to my question ekinsb.



I used your third solution by saving the information to a text file. It
works perfectly. I just need to make sure permissions are available in all
addins, which is handled by my installer(s).



I couldn't use a public method because there can potentially be several
addins that need to communicate, but I won't know which ones are installed
on the user's computer.



Thanks again for your help.



My question has been answered.