Compatibility a Plus and a Potential Problem

The VSoft Research documentation stresses compatibility a number of times. I decided to write a Visual Basic 6 program that reports the serial port configuration and test it on a number of machines that I knew presented problems in the past. The same Visual Basic 6 application ran fine under Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, and Windows XP. It also ran great on both a laptop and a desktop machine. Consequently, if you're writing a desktop application, you can probably believe that compatibility problems will be minimal.

The problem occurs when you try to perform the same task over an Internet or even an intranet connection. Because Active Port Pro relies on an ActiveX control to perform its work, you run into all of the problems that plague ActiveX controls in browser applications, plus a few problems that relate to remote access security. In short, even though Active Port Pro is an amazing product, it's not so amazing that you can build Web-based applications without problem. Active Port Pro still reduces your workload, but you'll probably want to plan plenty of testing time.

Seeing Your Hardware Again

Even though my review focuses on .NET development, I want to mention that Active Port Pro works in other environments. You'll find examples for Visual Basic 6, as well as Visual C++ 6 and 7. (According to the vendor documentation, they have tested Active Port Pro with Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0, Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0, Microsoft Visual FoxPro 6.0, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Borland Delphi 6, Borland Delphi 7, Borland C++ Builder 6, Microsoft Visual Basic .NET, Microsoft Visual C#, and Microsoft Visual C++ 7.0.) Consequently, one package works great for a number of programming environments. In fact, you can extend the product even further by creating COM components or a DLL for other programming environments. The point is that you have plenty of examples to use in learning how to access your hardware safely.

The bottom line is that even when you don't access your hardware every day, writing code to perform this task when you do can be a very painful experience. Active Port Pro reduces the frustration that programmers experience in performing this occasional task. You could easily make back the cost of buying the product in one project based on the time savings alone. The reduction in frustration is almost a gift that you can give yourself.