ROOMS 3D Desktops - Wallpaper Plugin SDK

Download ROOMS plugin SDK [555 Kb]

1. What
2. How
3. Download
4. Next

1. What

We publish a Software Development Kit [SDK] for ROOMS plugins.

The SDK helps you create and test your own RPC and RSI plugins. It is based around a program called PluginCenter.

PluginCenter creates skeletal and template C++ programs for each kind of plugin. Ideally you will use these and add your own C++ functionality. Skeletal code provides the C++ plugin interface only. Template code provides the C++ plugin interface plus some stock functionality for you to customize.

PluginCenter includes test harnesses for running both the raw DLL interfaces and for exercising dialogs like those used by plugins in ROOMS wizards.

The SDK includes the source code for the AVI movie and CD control RSI plugins so you can see how we have used the plugin interface.

The SDK also includes the RAV toolkit plugin which is experimental (i.e. not production quality), but which we have found useful to manipulate RAV files - so we offer it "as is" and it may be developed further in later releases.

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2. How

ROOMS plugins do not use COM. They are simple DLLs.

Plugin DLLs are best installed into the ../rooms/plugins folder.

Plugins are identified by their filename. RSI (Stream Interface) plugins have filenames ending "_rsi.dll". RPC (Polygon Conversion) plugins have filenames ending "_rpc.dll".

All RSI plugins share a common RSI DLL interface. All RPC plugins share a common RPC DLL interface. The interfaces are formally specified in PluginCenter F1 Help.

RSI plugins let you issue commands to a channel and let you get images on demand from the channel.

RPC plugins let you convert files from one format to another, and allow you to launch your own custom setup dialog(s) - for example to control polygon reduction.

Both plugin types optionally support normalizer interfaces, so, if you want, they can be fully integrated with the ROOMS export and normalizartion cycle.

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3. Download

Download ROOMS plugin SDK [555 Kb]

Once installed, you start PluginCenter from the ROOMS Setup and Start utility, see the button on the "Plugins" tab.

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4. Next

Once you have created your plugin and want to publish it, there are several things you can do:

1. publish it from your own site
2. ask us to provide a link from this site to your site
3. ask us to publish your plugin untested by us from this site, with your name and optionally a link to your site
4. ask us to publish your plugin tested by us from this site, with your name and optinally a link to your site
5. ask us to source-code review and test a plugin and publish from this site, with your name and optionally a link to your site.

If we source-code review and test your plugin and accept it under this category we refer to it as a "certified" plugin.

NOTE: If you want to request a payment from people who use your plugin(s), that is entirely up to you, and it is up to you to collect payment and implement your own licensing system. You must not, of course, demand payment for any plugin which is essentially one of those for which we publish the source code. I.e. We encourage you to add some value before charging.

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