CompuServe Messages

<< Can't find it now, but I could swear that yesterday I saw it declared here that MSVC++ 2.2 would be required for development work with 3DS Max. >> Currently it is, but who knows what version will be needed when Max ships. << I am interested in confirming that this is hooey perpetrated by somebody who doesn't understand the difference between "required" and "known to work".>> It isn't hooey, but I can understand how you might think it could be. << – We are told that plugins will be DLLs. It should not matter what so ever what creates a DLL. People _should_ be able to write 3DS plugins with Visual Basic. Not only would that be normal for Windows modularity concepts, it would also be a boon to 3DS, as many people who are scared of C++ are not scared of VB :. more modules. >> DLLs are DLLs, but the symbol names in the DLL's are what make it impossible for any compiler except MSVC. Any C++ compiler must "mangle" the names of its symbols to insure that name overloaded functions don't have the same symbol reference. Every C++ compiler on the market has a different way of "mangling" the names, so none of them can share C++ DLL's. As Gus pointed out, it would be possible for someone to write a 3DS plug-in wrapper that maps the C++ functions to C functions, that then could call a DLL from another source. The wrapper would have to have a great deal of knowledge about the other DLL, there could be no general solution. << – VC++ 2.2 is a subscription upgrade and the subscription costs more. If some twisted thing had been done to actually require 2.2, those of us not on subscription would be shut out. >> Autodesk has no choice in this matter. Microsoft has made this the case. The only way to make this different is to recompile 3DS Max in some other compiler or port it to another 4GL language (not VisBasic) altogether. This, however, would just bind 3DS Max to yet another compiler. << If I am correct, I am inclined to wonder how many of the 'requirements' for developing IPASs were not real requirements. I know that I decided the requirements were prohibitive and did not get into IPAS development.>> Autodesk has always sought to make the development environment for plug-ins as accessible as possible. Unfortunately, being on the the cutting edge of technology limits us. – Grant