Getting Started with Plug-Ins

Introduction

RFMS Measure plug-ins are .NET assemblies (.DLL files) which implement an interface called IPlugIn. The
interface defines just a few very simple methods to allow Measure to exchange data with an external
provider. The basic idea is shown below:

Measure communicates with the plug-in using the interface. Measure knows nothing else about where the data is coming from or going to. The Plug-in implements the interface and interacts with data using
whatever technique it likes. It is responsible for translating to or from the XML that Measure supports.

Interaction

To write a plug-in, simply add a reference in your project to bpmplugin.dll. This file is in the Measure program folder and contains the interface. Next, create a class that implements the interface. The interface requires that you supply these methods and properties:

Public Interface IPlugIn
    ReadOnly Property FullName() As String
    ReadOnly Property DisplayName() As String
    Function PerformAction(ByVal action As Integer, ByVal xml As String) As String
    Function SupportsAction(ByVal action As Integer) As Boolean
    Sub Configure(ByVal xml As String)
End Interface

FullName
The namespace and class of the object Measure should create.

DisplayName
The name shown to the user inside the Measure Plug-in dialog.

PerformAction
Perform a specific action, specified by an integer identifier. Any parameters for the operation are passed as an xml string. The actions, their parameters and return values are documented separately.

SupportsAction
Measure calls this method to ask your plug-in if it supports a particular action. Return true if your plug-in is prepared to respond to the given action. NOTE: Because additional actions may be added in the future, it is good practice to return false by default and only return true for those actions you are explicitly supporting.

Configure
Tells the plug-in to launch its configuration dialog box. Called when the user clicks Configure on the Plug-ins dialog in Measure. At the very least, the plug-in might show an About dialog.

Configuring Your Plug-In

To make your plug-in display in Measure you may do one of two things:

To manually install a plug-In

1. Choose Options from the Application menu
2. Choose Plug-Ins
3. Click Add and browse for your plug-in

To programatically install a plug-in

1. Include the msrplugin utility in your setup: http://www.rfmsmeasure.com/update/msrplugin.zip
2. Run this command line utility from the Measure program folder providing the fully qualified path to your plug-in as a parameter.