How to write named pipes application

[allynm]

am a newby with Windows named pipes, and have an obviously newby question.

The context of the program is this: I am trying to create a simple named pipe application on a single machine (no network!). A server creates a named pipe and a cllient reads/writes to the the server using a duplex pipe. The server is not multithreaded. The server has a main( ) and the client has its own main( ).

I am having huge conceptual difficulty understanding how the server with its main entry point can run at the same time as the client with its own main entry point. I keep thinking the two programs must be in different processes and therefore there must be a third program which creates the two processes, ie, the client and the server.

I have spent two fruitless days trying to hunt down examples of client/server and failed. The examples I have seen discuss the problem without clearly spelling out whether and how the client and server run concurrently. What I do know is that when I code the commonly available examples, I receive a message back saying that the pipe is could not be opened.

Any light that could be shown on this would be most helpful. If you could direct me to a good tutorial that clearly identifies the process architecture for this type of application that would be welcome too.

Sincerely,
Mark Allyn

[allynm]

Hello Everyone,

As often happens to me, after posting something and struggling some more, I get a solution. The answer is: Yes, you must indeed create a separate server process and a separate client process as well as a pipe connecting them. The program I wrote that does this is shown next:

#include <windows.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <tchar.h>

int main( int argc, char * argv[ ]) 
{
static TCHAR ClientName[ ] = TEXT("pipeclient.exe") ;
static TCHAR ServerName[ ] = TEXT("pipeserver.exe" ) ;
TCHAR CommandLine[ ] = TEXT("Server Joe") ;

STARTUPINFO ClientStartupInfo, ServerStartupInfo ;
PROCESS_INFORMATION ClientProcInfo, ServerProcInfo ;
HANDLE hProcServ, hProcCli ;
GetStartupInfo(&ClientStartupInfo) ;
GetStartupInfo (&ServerStartupInfo ) ;

CreateProcess (ServerName, CommandLine, NULL, NULL, FALSE, NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS,
	NULL, NULL, &ServerStartupInfo, &ServerProcInfo ) ;
hProcServ = ServerProcInfo.hProcess ;
printf ("Curr Server Process is : %d\n", hProcServ ) ;
WaitForSingleObject(hProcServ, 1000) ;
CreateProcess(ClientName, NULL, NULL, NULL, FALSE, NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS, 
	NULL, NULL, &ClientStartupInfo, &ClientProcInfo );
hProcCli = ClientProcInfo.hProcess ;
printf ("Curr Client Process is : %d\n", hProcCli ) ;
WaitForSingleObject (hProcServ, INFINITE) ;
WaitForSingleObject (hProcCli, INFINITE ) ;
CloseHandle (hProcServ); CloseHandle(hProcCli) ;
printf ("All Done!\n");
return 0 ;
}

Obviously, my client is in pipeclient.exe and the server is in pipeserver.exe.
The thing ain't pretty, but it works.

Any comments or suggestions on how to clean this thing up -- e.g, error correction code--would be appreciated.

Ciao,
'Mark