Microsoft's Component Object Model [L1 ] ...
(COM: Some people associate DOS-style serial-line devices with this. Information about that is on this page: Serial Ports on Windows.)
tcom offers both client and server COM functionality.
This is also included in recent ActiveTcl releases.
optcl ...
TclScript also is COM-aware.
TCLBridge allows Tcl to call COM objects and vice-versa. Very powerful, lots of options.
COSH ...
Many popular Microsoft Windows applications expose a COM automation [L2 ] interface, which allows external programs to launch and control them. The starting point to an application's COM automation interface is through its programmatic identifier (ProgID). Here are a few example ProgID's, any of which might be used in, for instance, tcom with
set application [::tcom::ref createobject $ProgID]
Netscape.Network.1 [http://developer.netscape.com/docs/manuals/communicator/OLE/ole2net.htm]
FrontPage.Editor.Document
Word.Document (note that WordPad is ''not'' a COM server)
InternetExplorer.Application
Excel.Application
Excel.Application.8
PDF.PdfCtrl.1
Word.Application
DSOleFile.PropertyReader
How one discovers the API for a COM-exporting application of interest.
[Explain relation between COM and WSH.]
Alex Martelli: "COM-related technologies seem mostly pretty good, except for the little detail that they're often huge, rambling, and full of redundancies and pitfalls -- this goes for the object model of WMI just as well as for those of MS Office applications."
phk Sometimes an object browser can help.
[Somebody ought to write an object browser in Tk ...] optcl can help here.