Plug-ins


Analyzer relies on external applications for all graphical-related jobs. So, for example, Analyzer is not able itself for create a pie graph representing the protocol distribution durin a certain time interval. Analyzer is able to calculate the raw data using its built-in monitoring and statistics functions but it is not able to display the result. Analyzer uses a set of external applications that are able to accept raw data (for example a CSV table) and print graphically the result.

These applications are dynamic link libraries (DLL) with Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) support. We will call them plug-ins in order to refer to the way in which they are used: they are such as objects which work only if they are plugged-in by the analyzer interface calls. In few words: they receive the data that has to be printed and the device context where the graph has to be drawn. This implementation offers the following advantage: the user can create a new plug-in which draws his prefer graph and, after inserting it in the plug-ins directory, Analyzer will be automatically able to display data according to the new graph. These files have the extension APG (Analyzer PluG-in).