>Currently I'm maintaining a VFP8 manufacturing application which compiles completely into a single executable. As the project has grown and is in a constant state of development, I'm wanting to break up the system into several modules to allow for easier updating during the work day. For example, if I'm trying to implement a new bill of materials report for our Manufacturing Dept, I'd rather not have to tell the Shipping Dept to exit the program so I can replace the EXE with the newest version.
>
>Fortunately, program is already divided cleanly by departmental function (Manufacturing, Shipping, Purchasing, etc.) and each module is already called from a master menu form. Can I "sub-compile" individual modules and run them with a DO command? If I run a DO EXE command, will global variables, etc., still pass through to the called EXE? If the user exits the called EXE will control return to the calling program?
>
>Obviously I've never done this and ANY recommendations would be appreciated.
>
>Thanks in advance.
>
>- Dean

Dean,

You can easily solve the exe problem with a loader. Replace your exe with a small loader. The loader (9-10k) will look whether there's a more recent app on the server, and if yes copy it to the local disk, and then execute the (copied) app

eg: \\Server\Program.exe (small loader), and users start in C:\LocalFolder\..
\\Server\Program.app ( your app instead of an exe)

(1) Make a loader.exe, code at the bottom

(2) rename loader.exe to your exe, eg program.exe

(3) instead of producing eg program.exe, produce program.app

(4) put the app on the server

(5) each time a user starts your exe, it will look for a newer app and copy it if necessary


I've been working like this for years and if I have a small change: I drop the new app on the network and tell the user involved to quit the app and restart the app.

** Loader
procedure Loader()
	lparameters	_p01,_p02,_p03,_p04,_p05,_p06,_p07,_p08,_p09,_p10,_p11,_p12,_p13, ;
				_p14,_p15,_p16,_p17,_p18,_p19,_p20,_p21,_p22,_p23,_p24,_p25,_p26,_p27

	
	acti screen
	_screen.Fontname = 'Courier New'
	_screen.Fontsize = 10
	
	
	set FullPath On
	
	local StartupApp, LocalApp, cmd, i, n
	n = pCount()
	
	
	StartupApp = addbs(justpath(StartUpExe()))+juststem(StartUpExe())+'.app'
	LocalApp = addbs(_vfp.DefaultFilePath)+juststem(StartUpExe())+'.app'
	
	cmd = 'do ("' + LocalApp + '")'
	
	for i = 1 to n
		cmd = cmd + iif(i=1, ' with ', ',') + '_p' + padl(ltrim(str(i,4,0)),2,'0')
	endfor
	for i = n+1 to 27
		release	('_p'+padl(ltrim(str(i,4,0)),2,'0'))
	endfor

	
	do case 
	case ( StartupApp == LocalApp )
		&& do nothing
	otherwise
		if( FileExists(StartupApp) )
			&& if outdated delete
			if( FileExists(LocalApp) )
				if( fdate(StartupApp,1) > fdate(LocalApp,1) )
					delete file (LocalApp)
				endif
			endif
			
			&& if LocalApp not there copy
			if( !FileExists(LocalApp) )
				copy file (StartupApp) to (localApp)
			endif
		endif
	endcase
	
	if( !FileExists(LocalApp) )
		=MessageBox('Cannot find ' + LocalApp, 0+16, JustStem(LocalApp))
		return
	endif
	
	release  StartupApp, LocalApp, i, n
	&cmd
	
endproc
*----------------------------------------------------------------------------
function	StartUpExe()
	do case
	case ( ':' $ sys(16,0) )	
		return	substr(sys(16,0), rat(':', sys(16,0))-1)
	otherwise
		return	substr(sys(16,0), rat('\\', sys(16,0)))
	endcase
endfunc
*----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Function	FileExists(FileName)
	declare Integer GetFileAttributes in win32api string @
	return (GetFileAttributes(@FileName) <> -1)
endfunc
*--------------------------------------------------------------------------