Introduction
Think, how many times you wanted to add PersistXML support to your existing ATL COM object? It is true, that it is supposed to be as easy as to add IpersistPropertyBagImpl or IpersistStreamInitImpl ATL Templates. Moreover those classes already share the use of property maps.
BEGIN_PROP_MAP( CMyClass )
PROP_ENTRY_EX( "Caption", DISPID_CAPTION,
CLSID_MyClassPropPage2, IID_IMyDual1 )
END_PROP_MAP( )
Lets do this to add XML support!
The Interface
I used IPersistVarXML interface name because Microsoft has already taken IPersistXML for Commerce Server 2002 and it was less convenient than I wanted. (It uses BSTR for the XML input output instead of VARIANT).
I designed my own IPersistVarXML interface (see IDL description below). This interface supports VARIANT as XML input and output. In fact it can even use ISAXContentHandlerfor (MXXMLWriter) the XML output!
[
object,
uuid(B66873EC-BBFF-11D4-A802-112233445566),
helpstring("IPersistVarXML Interface"),
pointer_default(unique)
]
interface IPersistVarXML : IUnknown
{
[propget, helpstring("property ElementName")]
HRESULT ElementName([out, retval] BSTR* bstrElementName);
HRESULT LoadXML([in] VARIANT varSource, [in, optional,
defaultvalue(0L)] IUnknown * pAttributes);
HRESULT SaveXML([in] VARIANT varSource);
};
template <class T>
class ATL_NO_VTABLE IPersistVarXMLImpl :
public IPersistVarXML,
public ISAXContentHandlerImpl<T>
This implementation makes heavy use of the Microsoft MS XML SDK (version 3 and higher). Therefore you need to have msxml3.dll or higher installed on your machine. (This DLL always comes with all latest versions of MS Internet Explorer or can be installed separately from www.microsoft.com/xml).
Supported properties
If your class is already derived from one of IPerPropertyBrowsingImpl, IPersistPropertyBagImpl, IPersistStreamInitImpl, and ISpecifyPropertyPagesImpl classes and have BEGIN_PROP_MAP() macro, IPersistVarXMLImpl can reuse this and you do not need to do anything extra!
If you need to save an internal object or handle some XML entries �manually�, you can use BEGIN_XML_CONTENT_MAP () macro. It creates one extra MAP for the XML parser and saver. This map is optional.
BEGIN_XML_CONTENT_MAP(CMyClass)
XML_CONTENT_LOAD_HANDLER(�ENTRY�, OnENTRY_HandleFunction)
XML_CONTENT_ENTRY(&m_objInternal1)
XML_CONTENT_SAVE_ENTRY(&m_objInternal2)
XML_CONTENT_CREATE_OBJECT( "ObjectName",
CLSID_AnObject, OnXMLContextCreateAnObjec)
END_XML_CONTENT_MAP()
HRESULT OnENTRY_HandleFunction(ISAXAttributes * pAttributes);
HRESULT OnXMLContextUser(IPersistVarXML* pAnOblect);
CComObjectGlobal<CMyInternalObject> m_objInternal1;
CComObjectGlobal<CMyInternalObject> m_objInternal2;
How to add XML support
To add PersistXML support to your ATL COM object you need:
- Add include: IPersistVarXMLImpl.h and IPersistVarXMLImpl.cpp in your project.
#include IPersistVarXMLImpl.h
- Derive your class from
IPersistVarXMLImpl:
class ATL_NO_VTABLE CSystemUser :
public CComObjectRootEx<CComSingleThreadModel>,
public CComCoClass<CSystemUser, &CLSID_SystemUser>,
public IDispatchImpl,
public IPersistVarXMLImpl<CSystemUser>
{
- Modify COM map. Add
ISAXContentHandler and IPersistVarXML interfaces to your object. BEGIN_COM_MAP(CSystemUser)
COM_INTERFACE_ENTRY(ISystemUser)
COM_INTERFACE_ENTRY(IDispatch)
COM_INTERFACE_ENTRY(ISAXContentHandler)
COM_INTERFACE_ENTRY(IPersistVarXML)
END_COM_MAP()
- Add public member
unsigned m_bRequiresSave:1;
- Add and/Or modify property map. Add only properties that need to be XML persistable!
BEGIN_PROP_MAP(CSystemUser)
PROP_ENTRY_EX( "Name", 1, CLSID_NULL, IID_ISystemUser )
PROP_ENTRY_EX( "Address", 2, CLSID_NULL, IID_ISystemUser )
END_PROP_MAP()
- Add XML Context map for extra functionality (handle dynamic object creation and savings, not standard data types support etc.).
BEGIN_XML_CONTENT_MAP(T)
XML_CONTENT_SAVE_ENTRY(&m_objInternal)
XML_CONTENT_LOAD_HANDLER("ALIAS",OnXMLContextAlias)
END_XML_CONTENT_MAP()
That�s it!
Uses
Use LoadXML(varSource) and SaveXML(varDest) functions of IPersistVarXML to save and load XML content. VarSource can be all supported ISAXXMLReader::parse() Variant types:
�The application can use this method to instruct the reader to begin
parsing a document from a variety of sources. Supported VARIANT types are:
VT_BSTR, SafeArray of bytes (VT_ARRAYVT_UI1), VT_UNK(IStream),
and VT_UNK(ISequentialStream). One-level referencing is also permitted.
VT_BYREF | VT_VARIANT d
VT_BYREF | VT_VARIANT -> VT_BSTR
VT_BYREF | VT_VARIANT -> IStream
VT_BYREF | VT_VARIANT -> VT_ARRAY|VT_UI1.�
(MS XML SDK manual)
varDest can be all supported IMXWriter::output() Variant types:
�Determines the output for MXXMLWriter. By default, the output property
is a BSTR (string) value. You can also set this property to any
implementation of the IStream interface, and the resulting document
will be written into the provided IStream. Setting this property to the
empty value (VT_EMPTY or " ") will return
output to the internal string and reset it.�
(MS XML SDK manual)
Because this implementation uses CComDispatchDriver::PutProperty() and CComDispatchDriver::GetProperty() base class must be IDispatch derived.
Sample application
I have created two Visual Studio 6.0 projects as an example of how easy it is to add XML support to ATL objects:
- AtlPersistXmlSample.exe � the main Dialog based application and
- MyObjects.dll �
SystemUser and classes implementations.
It can be compiled for both Unicode an ASCII platforms. Load AtlPersistXmlSample.dsw workspace in to Visual Studio, build two projects and run. It demonstrates XML file save/restore configuration for whole application and dynamic XML string generation (including all internal classes and collections) and visualization.
Reference material
