EA protocol handler - the thread

[Oliver F.]

As there seems to be some progress now I have created this thread to keep you folks updated about what is going on.

For those who have not followed the history of this feature, the ea protocol handler enables (at least Windows) users to access elements in EA from the outside via a EA://<guid> protocol scheme.
Canonic corporation (http://www.canoniccorp.com) had started such a handler but shifted priorities so the software is unfinished as for now.
Actually efforts are underway to open source the software. I am in direct contact with them and currently the license and open source repository is discussed at Canonic.
I will post updates as soon as they become available. Developer volunteers are still welcome as well as thoughts, ideas and feedback.

Oliver

[Oliver F.]

Since today the sources are available under Apache 2.0 license from http://sourceforge.net/projects/eaprotocol/

I checked them out and played a bit around with them. What can actually be done is to build a program with Visual Studio and give it a ea://model?c=connectionstring&e=guid URL.

Actually the program is still rather sensitive to timing problems. So far I have encountered RPC server problems when the EA loading process is slower than the handler expects.
I also did not manage to create a connection string suitable to be decrypted so I hacked around it.
Additionally there seems to be a bug in the discovery of a running instance.

Otherwise it does what one would expect: Take a guid of an element, package or diagram and open it in EA.

So the basics are laid, now additional work has to be identified to make it complete. Eg. encapsulate it into a real protocol handler to integrate into Windows Explorer. Or finalize the installation program.
A settings dialog would be also great.

Any contributors?

Oliver

[Oliver F.]

To keep you updated:
Some progress is being made.
We are currently testing a rudimentary installation setup so the protocol handler can be used on a daily basis.
However some cleanups are pending before it can be released and few improvements are scheduled.

Feel free to visit the project site at http://eaprotocol.sourceforge.net and leave feature requests as well.

Volunteers to help out are still welcome.

Oliver

[Oliver F.]

Things are quickly progressing regarding the EA protocol handler.
Creating new EA instances is now stabilized, and logging and the connection methods have been improved.

There will be three different connection methods to an EA repository.
1) You can give a full connection string (encrypted and base64 encoded) and a guid for the desired element/package/diagram
2) You can preconfigure connection strings and associate them to friendly names. The URL will then contain a reference to the friendly name and a guid for the desired element/package/diagram
3) You can define a preconfigured connection string to be the default and then reference it in the URL with a default name

Examples:

Code: [Select]

ea://model1?c=%2fgH%2bjil1ZOsHDun78LPBQlRSjB%2fJGN%2fc9RFs6xEVfsqnUqntn5aJYBDaebMdyumonnRjbNK%2fc9g%2bC0VtuW87WQ%3d%3d&e=8759F3EF2FB64b30AFA03025C17E77DB

References model1 with the connection string c=... accessing an element with the given guid (e=) in compact format. GUIDs in expanded format are workgin also.

Code: [Select]

ea://model1?&e=8759F3EF2FB64b30AFA03025C17E77DB
References the preconfigured repository model1 accessing an element with the given guid (e=) in compact format.

Code: [Select]

ea://default?&e=8759F3EF2FB64b30AFA03025C17E77DB
References the preconfigured default repository accessing an element with the given guid (e=) in compact format.

We hope that this satisfies corporate environments in which people are connecting to the same model differently (eg. from the office, home work, WAN, VPN, etc.) so different connection strings can be used.

Additionally an add-in in EA will ease creation of connection URLs so the only thing to do will be to choose an element and then select the appropriate entry from the context menu.

Stay tuned for prereleases. As usual feel free to visit http://sourceforge.net/projects/eaprotocol to leave comments and feature requests.

Oliver

[EA2412]

Hi Oliver

thanks for your description. It sounds like a very nice feature. Do you can write me a detailled description how I can use this function?

Thanks in advance

[Oliver F.]

Hi Oliver

thanks for your description. It sounds like a very nice feature. Do you can write me a detailled description how I can use this function?

The manual is not ready yet. But in the end you will be able to use an add-in to get the url for a package, diagram or element and paste it from the clipboard into your wiki, web site, text document, or wherever you want that link to be located. Clicking on that link opens EA with the element, package or diagram opened.

That is it.

Regards,

Oliver

[EA2412]

Hi Oliver,

it sounds like a feature I´ve searched for many times. When it will be finished ? Can you give me a test version?

Thanks in advance

[Oliver F.]

it sounds like a feature I´ve searched for many times. When it will be finished ? Can you give me a test version?

Packing it all together takes some effort which we would like to invest in finalizing the whole thing.

If you can wait another weak (no promises) things might look different. A prerelease will definitely follow.

Oliver

[EA2412]

Hi Oliver

how is the development going on? Is the addin a state which I can try? I´m really curious on it:-)

Thank you

[Oliver F.]

Hi Oliver

how is the development going on? Is the addin a state which I can try? I´m really curious on it:-)

Thank you

Actually we are combining it with an addin which eases URL generation. The installation and especially deinstallation is a bit tricky but we are working on it. Expect something soon.

Oliver

[EA2412]

Hi Oliver,

how are you doing? When do I can expect a test version of your nice addin?

Thanks in advance