IPipelineComponentDescription Interface

For the latest version of Commerce Server 2007 Help, see the Microsoft Web site.

The IPipelineComponentDescription interface makes it possible for pipeline components to identify the values that they read from the pipeline context, and the keys and values that they read from or write to the OrderForm object.

Although pipeline components are not required to implement the IPipelineComponentDescription interface, implementing this interface makes it possible for the Pipeline Editor to identify and display the elements that your component reads or writes. This information can help developers who are troubleshooting a pipeline configuration.

The IPipelineComponentDescription interface supports the following methods.

Method	Description
ContextValuesRead	Returns a SAFEARRAY VARIANT that identifies the pipeline context values that the component reads.
ValuesRead	Returns a SAFEARRAY VARIANT that identifies the values that the component reads.
ValuesWritten	Returns a SAFEARRAY VARIANT that identifies the values that the component writes.

The methods defined in the IPipelineComponentDescription interface all take a single parameter: the address of a VARIANT out-value. The VARIANT that the IPipelineComponentDescription methods store in this address must contain a SAFEARRAY of VARIANTs that contain a BSTR variable. These BSTR variables identify the values read from or written to the pipeline context or the OrderForm object. Because the VARIANTs in this SAFEARRAY contain simple BSTR variables, you can conceivably store any kind of string information in these BSTR variables. However, for the sake of aiding developers who are attempting to troubleshoot their pipeline configurations, it is recommended that you initialize these BSTR variables to reference only elements of the PipeContext object or the OrderForm object.

Remarks

Header: Pipecomp.h

Type Library: Microsoft Commerce 2000 Order Pipeline Type Library (Pipeline.dll)

IDL File: Pipecomp.idl