Hi everyone..

Would anyone know where I could find a good explanation on 'Pipes' in programming. I'm trying to understand how I might go about using input into a GUI application to display output in a dos console. As I understand it, the concept of pipes comes into this somehow.

I've googled this but am not able to find a clear explanation. Anybody know where there is one or something on that entire topic area?

Thanks again everybody..

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What operating system are you working with? I'm guessing windows, but I should check.

If so, this might be what you're looking for: http://dslweb.nwnexus.com/~ast/dload/guicon.htm

Hi Moschops.. thanks,, but it doesn't explain what pipes are. I did read this.
I just want to understand concepts such as this.

True, it doesn't explain what pipes are. So your question is more "what are pipes" than "how can I output information to a console from a GUI"?

Imagine two separate processes. You can think of this in simple terms as running two different executable programs. If they need to communicate, we enter the field of IPC - Inter Process Communication.

One way they can communicate is with a pipe; this is simply a facility provided by the operating system that acts as a simple FIFO queue. One process puts data into the pipe, the other process pulls data out of the pipe in the order it was pushed in. Conceptually, that's it.

The Windows functions for this are described here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa365780(v=vs.85).aspx

commented: Very good answer.. Thanks +1

thank you Moschops.. That really explains it well.

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