RMS Add-Ins: managing state using session variables

Posted by Ian on December 16, 2007, 9:22 am

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Hi,

I'm new to the world of RMS, but have been looking into making RMS Add-
Ins. I'm developing in C#.

I've got a couple of add-ins written that don't do anything particular
at the moment, but do need a way of passing state to each other.

The two add-ins are hooked into the InitializeTransaction and
PrintReceipt hooks. At the moment, I'm passing state around by using a
session variable.

However, what I find a little odd is that the session variables appear
to be implemented as a fixed 10-position array. For my initial testing
I'm just arbitrarily picking one slot in the array to use. And it
works a treat.

But, in a real-world deployment, I can't hard-code a slot to use. So,
should I just loop through all 10 slots, looking for the first free
one (if setting the variable) or one that conforms to a particular
type (if retrieving the variable)? But what happens if all 10 slots
are in use by other add-ins?

The only other options I can see are to either customize the database
and manage state through there, or to have something like a .NET
Remoting singleton to manage all the state. But those both seem like
using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

Please, someone tell me I've completely misunderstood how the session
variables work, and set me straight...

Cheers
Ian