Product idea re. fP and Windows

[Bob Rasmussen]

Hi all,

Brainstorm with me. 

PROBLEM: FilePro on Windows can not interact with other Windows software 
in any way other than command-line utilities (no DDE, OLE, DLL, script 
interface, etc. support). This prevents many kinds of interaction that 
would prove beneficial. Case in point is the recent request for modem 
dialer support. 

HOWEVER #1: FilePro CAN do socket operations.

HOWEVER #2: Our AnzioWin terminal emulation can do socket operations, and 
also has a fairly thorough scripting capability, which can interact with 
DDE, OLE, Windows Scripting Host, the Windows API, etc.

PROPOSITION: We could adapt AnzioWin into a script processor that does 
two-way interaction through a localhost socket connection. You folks could 
program fP programs to send commands to our module via socket operations, 
and receive back status information. Anything Anzio can currently do in 
controlling and interacting with local software would be possible. Some 
possibilities:

* Dial phone calls, react to phone calls
* Text to speech, using Windows SAPI
* Eject a CD or thumb drive
* Print a DOC, PDF, etc., file, on a specified printer
* Start an external program, with a variety of parameters
* Play sound and other media files
* Copy files via FTP or HTTP
* Scan documents
* Do two-way DDE conversations with Word, Excel, etc. 
* Manipulate the Windows environment using OLE calls.
* Interact with imaging applications
* Read and write data from the clipboard
* Block screensaver and hibernation
* Initiate and terminate network shares
* Browse for files
* Query Windows information, such as machine name
* and potentially anything else a program can do in Windows.

And in a wider scope, such a program could be configured to answer socket 
calls from DIFFERENT machines on the network (with proper safeguards, of 
course).

What do you think?

Regards,
....Bob Rasmussen,   President,   Rasmussen Software, Inc.

personal e-mail: ras at anzio.com
 company e-mail: rsi at anzio.com
          voice: (US) 503-624-0360 (9:00-6:00 Pacific Time)
            fax: (US) 503-624-0760
            web: http://www.anzio.com